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That night myself, Javier and the team, all 24 registered players had played a part in our league and cup double, had done the next logical thing – party all night! We had a small celebratory party after the league win, but we knew we had the cup game coming up, so we kept it small. After this game though, the shackles were off and we went all out to make it a night to remember.

The chairman had managed to call in a favour and rented out the lounge area of the biggest hotel in Gibraltar at short notice. I happened to get there last out of everyone, very uncharacteristic of me, but when I walked in I was showered with cheers and applause. The general feeling was it was down to me giving the team all the motivation they needed as well as the right tactics and only losing my temper when necessary (see the semi against Glacis for proof!). As I made my way over to the table holding the punch, the DJ came over, shook my hand and asked me if there was any type of music I wanted to be played. I told him I’m a massive synthwave fan, he just looked at me blankly was said ‘okay dude, I’ll play some hard house’. I did get talking to him later that evening and found out he’s from the USA and was doing a tour, mainly the party hot spots Lanzarotte, Ibiza and Benidorm, when he found himself a small job in Gibraltar to pass the time.

As the drinks were flowing, I had the bright idea that as I would soon be having an extra 5 thousand euro in my bank, I might as well splash out that night, so more or less paid for everyone’s night without giving it a second thought. I’m not sure exactly how long we’d been partying, but at some point Frank Heras was on the dance floor, dancing in what can only be described as choreographed mayhem, what else could you say about a 6 foot 4 mountain of a man swinging his arms here there and everywhere? He was getting a bit boisterous, and I was asked to go calm him down. As I made my way over to him, staggering and trying my best to keep my balance, I was caught square in the face by one of those long gangly arms of his. He hit me for 6 and I was out cold.

I was out cold for 5 hours, and when I woke up in the hospital, there was this pretty face just staring at me. In my half asleep half concussed state, I’d never seen such a beautiful face in all my life, I started to think this was an angel Saint Peter had sent to greet me at the Pearly Gates, or that I was in Purgatory or something. As I came to, I realised it was the clubs media relations director, an English lady called Rose Greene. I’d never looked at her twice before, I don’t actually think I’d ever even spoken to her, but I knew who she was. She said the players had carried on with the night as they expected me to be back, but Javier insisted on going with me, she said she’d come with me so Javier could stay with the team. I could barely remember what had happened and when she told me, I instinctively went to rub my nose when she yelled ‘No darling, not your nose!’ and she said it had been broken by Franks big fist, as well as fracturing my cheek bone. I just said oh God not my nose!

She asked why I said that, and I remembered a time during my years at Michigan that my mother had said footballers get a lot of facial injuries, and that I was too handsome to suffer such a thing, and a broken nose would never look the same again, to which I promised her I’d never get a broken nose as long as I was playing. Turns out I was right, no broken nose as a player, but 2 years into management, and here I was with a broken nose!

Once I was released from the hospital I was told to take it easy, but Frank was really upset about what happened and offered to repay me, by taking on another night out! Bless his heart, he paid for both our drinks and we had a great time. By 1AM I was in a small bar where there were a handful of people, and 1 of them recognised straight away, it was Rose. She was sat with her friend and I went over, my intention was just to thank her again for helping me out and seeing to me in the hospital. When her friend said she was leaving with a guy she’d been chatting to, Rose asked me if she could stay a bit longer with me. I didn’t’ think anything of it other than she was being friendly, but from then until all these years later, we were inseparable. Vince Irvine, if you’re reading this memoir son, this was how I met your mother.

The cup win was the catalyst for me and the team to prove this season wasn’t a fluke. We were expecting Lincoln to be right back up there after a poor season, as well as the other teams making moves to improve. With Verdejo retiring I made a move to replace with him Tony Hernandez who had let his contract run down at Gibraltar United and jumped at the chance to join us. That signing was followed up by Anthony Bardon joining before 2 more players joined us to really improve our title winning squad.

As Lincoln had gone through 2 managers, 2 caretakers and a really poor season, Callum Driver and Bryan Goncalves grew disillusioned there and also left on a free and were signed by us. They bought into my vision of retaining the league, and were excited by the prospect. Both had only joined Lincoln during preseason last year, and their time there wasn’t enjoyable. Both had a point to prove and I felt both could help us retain.

The club had never featured in the Champions League, so it was Saint Josephs maiden appearance as well as my own debut in the UEFA Champions League. We were drawn against HB Torshavn of the Farore Islands and the first leg was away. The flight there was horrible and full of turbulence, and little did I know but Michael Garcia was petrified of flying. I told him he could either drive his way to Denmark or Sweden, and then take a ferry up to Torshavn, or however else he was to get there. But by car to Denmark was around 34 hours, passing through 5 countries, then however long on a ferry up to the Farore Islands. The logistics of it weren’t viable, especially for a club like ours and with money not really being there, I told him, reluctantly he would have to sit this one out.

As for our first game in the Champions League, we had a goal chalked off early for offside, but that didn’t dampen our spirits as we ran out 2-1 winners. 2 away goals was a great result, and the goal they scored wasn’t ideal but we were happy with the result. The return leg was much of the same as we won with the same score line to record a 4-2 aggregate win. I wasn’t getting ahead of myself but I couldn’t help but think we might just make the groups.

Next up were FK Aktobe of Kazakhstan. This time around we were drawn as the home team in the first leg, and we scraped a 1 all draw, Garcia grabbing our equaliser. The return leg didn’t feature Garcia, but we didn’t deserve to win, but neither did FK Aktobe as we played out a 0-0 draw, meaning they went through on away goals. We were disappointed, but knew without any extra away games to far off destinations might just help us in our conquest to retain our league crown.

Before we could concentrate on getting ready for the new season, Javier Casquero, my assistant and my steady hand for the last 2 years had a chat with me, and it was something I wasn’t ready for. Real Gijon in Spain’s second division had approached him to be their assistant. He knew the manager from their days at Las Palmas, and he wanted to take the opportunity to progress. I was shocked at this, but I didn’t begrudge him. I told him a man’s got to do what he feels is right, and if going to Gijon was what Javier wanted to do I would let him go with my blessing. If for nothing else, it was definitely progression for him and I hoped inside I would be given a similar sort of opportunity. He told me some great things about me and our time together, and he said he hoped our paths cross again in the future.

Little did either of us know at that time, but it wouldn’t too far into the future that our paths would cross again.



I'm going away for a week tomorrow, so there won't be another update until a week on Monday at the earliest. Thanks for reading!

2 games and potentially 2 trophies. I’d been here last season, sort of. We’d finished runners up in the league as well as losing in the cup final. I really didn’t want another runners up medal in either competition, neither did the team.

In what was at the time my biggest pre match team talk, I told the team we weren’t favourites to win the league, but we’d exceptionally well to get to where we are. The pressure was all on College Europa, which it was. I felt we could go into the game relaxed and just play to our strengths. The team seemed to agree with me.

As noted earlier in my memoirs, you always remember your first of everything, and this game was no different. This is one that sticks in my mind vividly. As soon as the ref blew his whistle to start the game, I knew. I knew as soon as we had the ball in those opening few moments of the game, I knew we were going to win it. Straight from kick off Garcia played it to Tirada out wide on the left, he ran 8 or 9 yards, passed in field to Walker, who took on the defence, cut inside on his right foot and rifled the ball at the keeper. It was dead center and the keeper should’ve made a routine stop, but he flapped at it and the defence eventually punted it out for a throw. That’s when I knew this is it for us.

It wasn’t long before we took the lead. I just thought if we pressured them we’ll get the upper hand. The keeper was all over the place, he didn’t look confident at all. Any crosses that came in he missed catching them, when he rushed off his line he hesitated, I told the team to put pressure on by not allowing short goal kicks. On a passage of play shortly before half time we got the lead by playing Garica inside right channel, he took it passed the defence and the keeper made his move, but as he did Garcia trapped the ball, looked for the run of Walker inside, as he did the keeper spotted him and Garcia chipped the ball up and over him into the empty net.

During half time I just told the lads I’m happy with how it’s gone, I told the front 2 to keep pressuring the keeper, he’s not having his best day, and the defence really hadn’t had much to do up until that point. From the first whistle to the last in the second, we never looked like losing this one. We added 2 more goals, both mistakes by their defence and keeper, and we were crowned, quite rightly so, Gibraltar Primera League champions, which is Saint Joseph’s first league win since 1996, a full 22 years ago!

Winning this league obviously isn’t that big a deal outside of Gibraltar, but the last year, and for the 12 that preceded it, everyone was expecting Lincoln to be crowned champions again. Well they would’ve done, had it not been for that pesky Chris Irvine and his band of unfancied but totally committed footballers!

After the celebrations had calmed down, I was alone in the changing room, writing in my diary as it happened, and Stuart Rodriguez walked in, with a bottle of whisky and 2 glasses. He told me he knew I’d be the last one to leave, I always made the point of being the first in and last out, and he came to speak to me alone. Without going into too much detail, we finished the bottle of whisky, and Stuart told me how much this league win meant to him and his family, and that he’ll forever be grateful for our efforts this season. He also gave me an envelope, and in this envelope would be the thing that I used to negotiate every contract I signed from that moment on. Inside the envelope was a cheque for 5 thousand euro. I told him I couldn’t accept this, but he insisted on my taking it. He said it was the least he could, Saint Josephs were in for a windfall for just qualifying for the Champions League, and with the money they were going to get the club would have no debt and be able to run on a profit for at least the next 2 seasons. Once I took the cheque I decided there and then from now on, I was going to put an emphasis on bonuses based on competition wins. I figured I’d have more negotiating power if I took a lower basic wage, I jotted down in my diary this was going to my mission for commission. It’s something I’ve stuck to ever since.

Just before the upcoming cup final, Frank approached to say he was going to retire at the end of the season, but before I had chance to reply, he told me he had reconsidered because we’d won the league, and he wanted to be part of the team that attempted to retain it. He was always an absolute professional with me, and I thanked him and told him we would be going all out next season again, but that we’ve got the cup to win first. In the run up to the cup final, the end of the season awards were made, and I had won the manager of the year award, which was a nice honour and well deserved. Liam Walker got signing and player of the year, and Michael Garcia’s 21 league goals made him the division’s top scorer.

We then had the cup final, and I was so determined to win this after finishing runners up last year, I was too nervous to attend my pre match presser that day.

Someone who wasn’t nervous however, was outgoing player, and hat trick hero      Jose Verdejo. He was in inspired form, he controlled the game and I was concerned that he was going to be too big a miss next season. But as we were given the cup, and Jose and I shared a moment, he said something to me that will stick with me forever. When I told him how happy and proud of his performance I was, I said it will bring a tear to my eye knowing he’s not coming back next season. He replied with ‘Boss, cry later, but for now let’s enjoy the laughter’ and we partied long into the night.

We had 5 games left to go in the league by April, and the cup semi was also coming up. Good form was a must, and the boys didn’t disappoint. A 3-0 win over Gibraltar Phoenix preceded a 6-0 win over Lynx FC that didn’t flatter either of us as we were fantastic, Gibraltar Lions felt the follow up as they were battered 5-1 by us, the Walker/ Garcia combo working wonders as usual then we played the same team in the semi of the cup.

That 5-1 drubbing had me confident we would win in the cup against Lions, but it must’ve lit a fire under them because they came out swinging in this game. They held no punches and for the first time since going down to Glacis at the start of the year, we were put under some serious pressure. I’m not kidding, they were by far the better team. I thought complacency had started to creep in, but at half time there was a heated exchange between Frank Heras, my center half, Liam Walker and full back Moto. Harsh words were exchanged, threats made but the bottom line was the team, all 11 of the players on the field were in unison, we’d been poor. Frank made a costly mistake early in the first where he mis-controlled a routine sideways pass and in his attempt to recover tried passing back to Robba in goal, but he was off balance and the ball trickled away, with Daniel Pinot, one of their front 3 on the day, picked it up, pelted toward goal and tucked it under Robba’s feet. From the restart myself and Javier Casquero were screaming at the players, and really one of us should’ve taken charge there, and as it transpired during the same heated conversation in the dressing room myself and Javier had our first real bust up. He blamed me for not organsing the defence, I told him come on, it was a simple mistake by Frank, I was sticking up for him as best I could. He’d been there for me since I came here and was my most trusted player on the field, and I told Javier he should’ve left me to relay instructions. Of course we were in agreement our bickering on the side-line had confused the team, and low and behold we were 2-0 down before half time.

During the break, once we’d all calmed down, we decided to match them like for like formation wise. Verdejo was to go up top with Garcia, and Walker was to start in the forward position but drift in and out between striker and attacking midfield. These 3 were going to be key for us if we were to get something from this game. The 3 in the middle were to be Sequera, who I told to try and dictate play, Carlos and Yepes were to be the runners trying to get the ball back. Under no circumstances were the back 4 to stray forward, we had to be structured at the back. On the way out for the second, I pulled Frank aside and told him he was unlucky for the mistake he made, he just smiled and went out on the pitch.

The second half was the Frank Heras show, really it was. Straight away they were obviously going the route one way, and time and time again we lost possession and they hoofed it forward to their strikers, but time and time again there was Heras to head the ball away, punt it out of play or head it down towards Nixon his center half partner. Nothing got passed him in the first 10 minutes of the second half. From one of those long balls, Heras nodded down to Nixon who in turn passed it back to him, Frank looked up, spotted Verdejo making a run to left and played a long ball of his own over the top, Verdejo controlled it, faked going inside and went straight for the byline. The defender had no chance, and Verdejo whipped in a low cross which the keeper got a touch to, but it fell straight to Garcia who smashed it home, 1-2 and game on!

We kept plugging away, bombing forward but when we got caught and they attacked, there was Frank to clean up each and every time. By the time the fourth official put up the board to indicate 3 minutes of extra time, it looked like we were going to luck out. We’d not had any corners in this game but managed to get one right before full time. Walker whipped in an in swinging corner but it got cleared. Moto, edge of the box opens his body up to shoot, but instead he catches everyone off guard and plays it back out to Walker who’s still on the right wing. As every one of our players was offside they stepped back, as they did Walker swung the ball to the far post and there was Frank who was still forward from the corner, rushing in, eyes on nothing but the ball and plants a picture perfect diving header into the net to take us to extra time! It was nothing short of magical, and for the first time this season I really jumped out of my seat in celebration.

Extra time literally came and went in this game, both teams were out on their feet, neither of us committed men forward, and penalties seemed likely. When the ref blew the whistle, I named the 5 men who would be taking penalties, Verdejo, Walker, Yepes, Garcia and Moto. I told them it was up to them what order they took the penalties, but it was them 5 no one else. Robba in goal stood with us and told us which order they were taking the kicks. He seemed confident.

Both teams missed their first pens, Walker hit the post and Franci for them skied it.

Yepes stepped up and buried his, Perez for the hit right down the middle but Robba’s leg was there to stop it going in.

Garcia, buried his, Verdejo’s effort was save, and Sayers wrong footed Robba for them.

Last 2 now, and up stepped Moto who smashed his into the net, 3-2 on pens and they had to score.

Munoz for them stepped up, did a stupid little Pogba-esque slow run up, tried to do that little stumble trick but Robba was on to him, he hit the ball to his right and Robba’s left, and Robba guessed right and not only saved the shot but held on to it as well, it was a weak effort really, and we’re into the final of the Rock Cup again!

Our reward for that semi win is a final against bottom of the league and relegation threatened Glacis United who beat us the last time we played. We have to be confident, but wary of them.

Our penultimate game of my second season was our final meeting of the season with Lincoln Red Imps, and what has become custom in our meetings, we beat them 2-1, and at the same time Glacis beat league leaders College Europa 2-0, and this was significant for us.

Going into the final game the league looked like this:

1 – College Europa 57 points

2 – Saint Josephs 55 points

Meaning if we win our final game, coincidentally against College Europa, we’d win the league. If we failed to win, they would win the league. It was all to play for.

Before the draw for the Rock Cup was made, I received a phone call, it was a number I had saved so I knew who it was, but I was surprised by who was ringing.

I answered, and a familiar voice spoke to me. He seemed sincere enough in his tone, and was asking for 2 things. The first was the opportunity to train with us, I asked why, he said he’d not been able to secure a contract at another club so was out of shape, and the second thing he asked for was the opportunity to prove himself, and hopefully win a new contract with us. The voice was none other than John-Paul Duarte. The same John-Paul who assured me that the reason he wasn’t singing a new deal with us last season was because Lincoln, the same Lincoln that we’ve beat twice now, were close to signing him on a deal that we surely couldn’t match. I had a million responses in my head that I wanted to say, ranging from fuck you, to oh you’ve come crawling back, but I held my tongue and I told him the truth at first.

I told him we simply didn’t need him. Liam Walker had come in and been our star man so far, Garcia was banging goals in left right and center, and our midfield was playing well there was no way I could drop any of them, or change things up to accommodate another striker. He then went off on one, claiming I’m riding the coat tails of my father and that I’m nothing of a manager and my luck would soon run out. I responded by telling him, defiantly, that nobody promised me anything, and we’re where we are on merit, nothing else. He then just hung up the phone.

Moving away from the absurd, we were drawn in the Rock Cup second round against Europa Point who were relegated last season, but were top of the Second Division. We took bottom of the league  Glacis lightly though as our first game in the New Year ended with a 2-1 loss to them, the only bright spot being a goal from Verdejo, but we were 2 down and it was the last minute of the game. After the game he approached me and explained that he’s decided to call it a day and retire at the end of the season. I wasn’t expecting it, but only he knows if it’s the right decision, and he assured me he’d be giving 100% from now until then, and he certainly proved that as the months went on.

Leading up to the cup game we beat Gibraltar United (3-0) and played a 3 all draw with Lynx FC. I made it clear to the team that we’re not taking either Europa Point, or this cup lightly. We did run out 2-0 winners, Verdejo proving his point by grabbing both goals. We were drawn against Lincoln in the quarter final. Usually, drawing Lincoln would be somewhat of a worry, but they’ve been poor this season, not to mention the 2 wins we’ve taken from them already. I was confident heading into that game.

Until then though, I kept this to myself, but it was around this time (end of January) that I genuinely believed we could win the league. We went on another great run, taking points from Gibraltar United, Gibraltar Lions, and leaders at the time Europa College and then Mons Calpe. Then we had the semi against Lincoln Red Imps. Historically Gibraltar’s biggest team. Currently 4th in the league, disappointing for them, and we came in to the game both in good form (5-1-1) as well as beating Lincoln in the last 2 games we’ve played.

The game itself was what you’d call a good cup game. Both of us wanted, nay needed the win. We took the lead through another Verdejo goal, a lovely ball over the top by Walker and Verdejo hit it first time. They equalised on 78 minutes and all the while looked like going to penalties. I remember screaming at Liam Walker to do something, anything to get this win, and in the final minute, he got the ball just past center circle, went on a mazy run, wrong footing 2 defenders and slipping the ball into Garcia’s path who buried it! 2-1 and we’re into the semi final!

That win was bitter sweet in many ways. Sweet because we’d got the win, and we’re 1 step closer to the cup final, but bitter because that game was Albert Parody’s final game as Lincoln boss, as they sacked him on his way out of the stadium. Football can be a ruthless business sometimes. As I made my own way out some time after everyone else, I’m hounded by a couple of reporters who are saying I’m once again linked to the job. This happened at the start of the season, I’m linked to the job, apparently they’re put off by my release clause, but this time I just told the reporters that I’m happy we got the win, I’m disappointed for Albert, but he’s not get the results this season, and that I’m happy at Saint Josephs. And just like the first time they apparently wanted me, nothing came of the interest. Their loss really.

We were drawn against Gibraltar Lions in the cup semi final, a team we’ve not lost to in the last 3 meetings between us, and we rounded out March with a 1 all draw with Manchester 62.

With only 2 months left in the season, I was offered, and accepted a new 1 year deal to stay with Saint Josephs. It was a no brainer really. Privately I thought we’ve got 1 hell of a chance to win the league, we’d just have to catch College Europa first, and we’re well on course to get to the cup final again.

It didn’t take long for my initial thoughts of a good campaign, and Liam Walker being integral to them to play out. 15 minutes into our season opener against Mons Calpe (who thumped us 8-0 last season) and Liam was on the score sheet. A bit of build up play resulted in him getting the ball, inside left channel and curling an incredible shot around the keeper into the far corner. We doubled our lead when Walker and lone striker Garcia linked up well, last season Garcia was the small man in our big man little man combo, but this time he received the ball 40 or so yards out, passed to walker and moved around the defender, as he did walker dinked the ball over the top, Garcia took a touch to steady himself, then buried the ball under the keeper. 2-0 and we’re cruising. The icing on the cake was when our new man hit an absolute worldie to make it 3-0 and game over. Edge of the box, he’s unmarked, Garcia this time turns provider and is doubled teamed but manages to squeeze the ball to Walker, he doesn’t even look up and hits it with his laces, keepers in no mans land and the ball nearly took the net with it! If there was ever a debut to show your new team mates what you’re all about, this was it!

If you remember from previous chapter, I mentioned about changing up my team talks, well on this day, I decided just to tell the lads how well they’d done, and that naming my intended starting 11 was justified with that win. Before leaving I said if we carry on like that, we’ll have a good season.

We then went on a good run to kick off my second season in Gibraltar. We gained a draw against Manchester 62, before getting wins over Galcis (3-0), Gibraltar United (5-1), drew with Lynx (0-0) and beat Gibraltar Phoenix 4-0, before the first of 3 league games against Lincoln Red Imps.

Before the game I was approached by the new manager Albert Parody who told me, in the most arrogant way possible, that he was always Lincolns first choice as manager once Julio Ribas had decided he was going back to Uruguay. I laughed it off and told him confidence is sky high at Saint Josephs, and if he hadn’t noticed we’re the leading scorers in the league with 15 goals in 6 games. He just gave me a smile with his shit eating grin and walked off.

I was nervous about this game, yes we beat them last time in the league last season, but they were still the big boys and were again unbeaten coming into this game. But a funny thing happened again. We were both unbeaten before the game, we were 4-2-0 and they were 5-1-0 with a slightly better record. They were top, we were second. But after the game, the record read 5-2-0 and 5-1-1. Once again we’d stopped Lincoln Red Imps unbeaten record. For the moment at least we were sitting top of the Primera division, and it was a good feeling.

Following beating the champs were wins against Gibraltar Lions (4-2) and College Europe (3-2) which gave me my third manager of the month award in 14 months as a manager. Things were looking good and we were top of the league, closely followed by Lincoln and Europa Point. But that old saying all good things must come to an end kicked in, as Mons Calpe beat us 2-1 in a game where we were second best all over the pitch. Drastic measures weren’t needed as we were all annoyed by this result, and we bounced straight back with a win over Manchester (2-0) that saw us sitting second in the league, 11 games played and on 26 points.
College Europa were sat top of the league, Lincoln had actually lost the 3 games following the defeat to us and were in 4th place at this time.

As January was nearly here, it meant that the upcoming transfer window was opening, and it wasn’t long before I was approached by someone as a potential signing.

This coming season was all about at the very least replicating our showing from my first season in Gibraltar. New singings were a must as 8 players all left after not renewing their contract. My main players, as in the guys I built the team around this season thankfully signed on for another season. Garica, 21 goals in all competitions, Verdejo who had found a new lease of life up front, Steven and Carlos our 2 starting central midfielders and Veras the center half and first name on the team sheet. Goalkeeper Felix had left so we needed a new keeper.

As the whole scouting and signing player’s thing was new to me, I had a meeting the clubs director of football Angel Jose, an ex footballer turned scout turned director of football. He suggested a few players who were interested, so we arranged trials for them and I was impressed. From the trials I managed to sign attacking midfielder Raul Segura who was a Lynx FC player last season. We also managed to sign full back Miguel Tirado who can play at the left or right back position, and signed goalkeeper Jamie Robba who was last season back up keeper at Torquay United in England, as well as having 7 caps for Gibraltar to his name, he brought some good experience with him.

It wasn’t long before the team was taking shape, when the availability of a player was brought to my attention. Attacking midfielder Liam Walker, capped 25 times by Gibraltar, had left College Europa at the seasons end. This was quite a big thing really, as he was one of the so called better players in the Gibraltar national side, and had played 2 seasons at Lincoln, winning the league twice of course, when before then he’d played in Israel, as well as making 30 league appearances for Portsmouth in England after starting his career in Spain. All in all he’d made over 250 league appearances, and at 29 still had a lot to offer, especially in the Gibraltar Premier League. His tally of 5 goals and 11 assists were decent enough numbers in the side that pipped us to the Rock Cup last season, and I thought instead of letting the director of football know what I was going to , I just did it. I spoke to my assistant Javier Casquero and asked him his opinion on approaching Liam, and he was all for it. He said he knew Liam’s agent, a man name Roque Marquez who had a number of players on his books, most being based in Spain. I found his number on a document held in the clubs books and gave him a call.

When his office answered I explained who I was, what club I was calling from and left a message. Not long later, maybe 10 minutes, he rang me back. After the pleasantries were over, he said Liam was actually interested in speaking with me and the club and they were going to be contacting us in the future, so it was a nice surprise I called them. I didn’t believe it to be true, but I thanked them for the interest and we agreed to meet for a face to face to discuss him signing for us.

We met in a small café right on the Gibraltar / Spain border, it was a nice quaint little café and the meeting went well. His agent asked what our plans for the season were, I confirmed we’re looking to match the second place finish in the league as well as hopefully, with a bit of luck, winning the Rock Cup this year. They asked about his minutes and what position I saw him best in, I confirmed in no uncertain terms he would be in our starting 11, probably playing behind the striker, as Verdejo, as much as he’d impressed late on last season probably wasn’t going to be up to 27 league games, plus the cup games at 36, and that I was toying with the idea of playing 1 up top with an attacking midfielder behind him, all being that midfielder being Liam Walker. The agent confirmed they’d discuss it between them and get back to us. On my way out I told Javier I thought the meeting went well and that they seemed keen, Javier was more concerned about us approaching a player without telling the club or director of football, but I wasn’t concerned. If we pulled this signing off, no one will care as he is a quality player, if not, well then I’d address that at the time.

I was confident that with the players we’d already signed, as well as a couple of youth prospects coming through we’d have at the very least a season like the one that had just finished. It was a couple of days after speaking to Liam’s agent and they’d not got in touch. I did ask the director of football how long these things take, when he replied that Liam had signed the deal and was on his way to us that afternoon! I couldn’t believe it at first and asked him why I wasn’t informed. The agent was just following the protocols he’d been used to by contacting the club and not the manager, but I wasn’t concerned. We’d signed a great player and one I genuinely thought could turn our fortunes around, not that we’d had a bad time of it, we just needed that spark I thought to get us over the line, and maybe get our hands on that Rock Cup.

From then the usual pre season stuff came out from the media and as for the 13th straight year Lincoln Red Imps were overwhelming favourites to win the league, despite a new boss in charge. As well as that, despite our cup run and subsequent second place finish last year, the press had us finishing fourth, 2 places above the sixth place finish from last seasons predictions. I thought it was a bit insulting really, but I didn’t let it bother me, it was probably due to Duarte spitting his dummy out and leaving that we weren’t predicted higher, but with Garica playing well all season last year, with Walker coming in, Verdejo looking like the best impact player we could’ve asked for, a solid back line and an experienced goalkeeper, I felt this season was going to be a good one.

Before our first game against Mons Calpe, I told the team exactly what our starting 11 would be, assuming no injuries, suspensions or loss of form. The team I set up with was going to be 4-4-1-1.

GK Robba
RB Moto
CB Heras
CB Remorino
LB Tirado
RM Yepes
CM Lopez
CM Segura
LM Catinzano
AMC Walker
ST Garcia

This was the strongest starting 11 I felt we could field. Verdejo was happy to be an impact player and genuinely was a model professional for me. We had 2 young lads, forward Ghio and winger Warner, both Gibraltan who came though the youth ranks, and they were on the bench. At the time I lied to them and told them I wanted to integrate them into the team, but really they were there as we needed a minimum of 6 home grown players in the match day squad, and I only had 4. However, as time went on, they would certainly get their chance to impress.

Thanks for the positive words man!

Finishing second in my first season was very much unexpected, but very welcomed. I felt in myself I had come into my own and was really getting into being a football manager. We had, for all intense purposes over achieved. Was it the new manager effect? Was it beginners luck? Who knows, but we were in the Rock Cup Final and my confidence was sky high. Saint Josephs FC were in their 10th Rock Cup Final, but I wouldn’t make it a 10th final with a win. Here was where I made my first big mistake as a football manager.

On the day of the final, I was unusually relaxed. I’d made finals in the lower leagues of American football, as well as during my time at Michigan and nerves didn’t really affect me too much. I had the usual pre match presser, gave nothing away in terms of team selection and just smiled at the 1 reporter there.

Heading into the game, we had won our last 4 games, 1 against the top dogs, and had Verdejo scoring for fun (5 in 4). Right before kick-off I announced the team. I usually did this an hour or so before kick-off, but I just said to the team it would be the same starting 11 that started the last 4 games. Here is where I made the first big mistake of my career.

I told the team, calmly, that they should just relax, and the result would come. We’ve won the last 4 games, we’re not changing anything and we’ll have our hands on that trophy. The lads seemed relaxed. At the time I didn’t realise most of them were a little too relaxed. I quickly picked up on this 9 minutes into the game.

For you see, after 9 minutes and 6 shots, 5 on target for our opponents, they opened the scoring. Their forward Jaurequi had latched onto a perfectly weighted through ball and toe poked the ball under Felix in the goal, and it was no more than they deserved. I yelled from the touchline and we finally got ourselves into the game. We pressed when we had to, we sat back when they had the ball but didn’t face much more pressure. Our own pressure paid off when Garcia and Verdejo linked up really well and equalised on half time.

During the break, I tried to explain that whilst I said we would win before the game, I went the other way and lost the dressing room when I said I demanded a better showing in the second half. Only Garcia seemed to react as he was straight back out to the pitch.

I should probably let you know at this point, Duarte hadn’t turned up for our pre match briefing, or even to the stadium pre game, his head was all but gone from Saint Josephs, and good riddance. I’d have the final laugh however.

Back to the cup final, and the second half was marginally better than the first. Both teams were going for it, and by the 70th minute, I had a decision to make. Verdejo had contributed for the first goal, but was looking jaded. I had no out and out striker on the bench, so I brought Verdejo off and replaced him with Moto and told him to play off Garcia in the hole.

Once the sub was made Caballero went in 2 footed on Europa goal scorer Jaurequi bit that didn’t end his game, but it did end Caballero’s, as he was given a straight red and that was that, our hopes of winning the final were gone. I had to persevere with Moto and Garcia up top, but brought center mid Carlos off for versatile player Picardo to try and catch them on the counter.

2 minutes after our reshuffle, Jaurequi got the ultimate revenge on Caballero by scoring to put them 2-1 up, and hit the final nail in our coffin on 87 minutes as he sealed his hat trick. In the dressing room after the game, the team were dejected, the realisation of what had transpired kicking in now. I didn’t say anything as I grabbed my stuff, got changed in silence and left.

It was at that moment I decided to myself that I was going to go about my team talks in a much different fashion.


In the days after the cup final, we were given the Gibraltar FA’s club of the season award which was a nice nod to our progress I thought. Now here’s where things got a little bit interesting for me.

If you remember from a previous chapter I told you to keep in mind the release clause the chairman put in my contract. At some point around the time of my signing the extension, Chris Rodriguez was approached by Lincoln Red Imps as to my availability. I wasn’t told about this, but Lincolns manager Julio Ribas had told them he wouldn’t be signing on at the end of the season, and was leaving. Here was a manager that had won the league 3 times in a row, as well as a couple of Rock Cups, Lincoln winning the league for the last 12 years, they really are the Celtic of Gibraltar. He had won it all in Gibraltar so was going back to his home country of Uruguay. Once news of his departure had broken, my name was instantly linked as the number one candidate for the job. Was I really being linked to the top job in the country after only 1 season? I wasn’t expecting to hear anything, and I certainly wasn’t going to press the issue myself. Privately I was thinking to myself if I went in for and got that job, it might open doors for me later down the line. The Gibraltar football press ran an article and 1 line jumped out at me:

‘Anyone who gets the Lincoln job, is guaranteed a league title on their resume’

As Ribas had won the last 3 with Lincoln, he’d taken his 3 league titles and got a job in Uruguay. A league title, albeit in Gibraltar would definitely open doors for me, but Saint Josephs had been good to me by giving me my first start in football, and really, we’d had a better season than Lincoln Red Imps, hear me out! They were expected to win the league, expected not to break a sweat and almost had a perfect season had it not been for that loss to us. We’d been expected to sit near the bottom of the league and struggle to stay up, we finished second. We were expected to go out of the cup early on, we came runners up.

I didn’t declare my interest in the job and the reports kept saying I was the front runner but the topic never came up in meetings I had with the chairman. A couple of weeks went by, the players were all on their end of season break, and I read the morning report that confirmed that Lincoln had appointed the Lynx FC manager Albert Parody. They’d finished 6th in the league but the main talking point was that apparently, this was news to me at this time, Lincoln had spoken to Stuart Rodriguez and were apparently put off by the 80% release clause in my contract. I’d have thought if that they had approached my current club they’d have to at least let me talk to them, but after asking the chairman he flat out refused this was the case. He’d assured me he hadn’t spoken to Lincoln about me, and he said he had no reason to lie to me about it, so I took his word for it.

I never mentioned it again.

Getting to the semi final of the cup would be a great achievement for me in my first year as a manager, and that is exactly what we did, when we beat Mons Calpe 2-1 to get some sort of revenge for that absolutely abysmal showing when they beat us 8-0. Shortly after the game we’re drawn against Manchester 62, who we haven’t lost to in the 2 league meetings so far, so another game where I was confident of winning.

To continue with the good news, for April 2017 I was awarded my first ever manager of the month award, and to this day I still have the bottle of (cheap!) champagne I was awarded by the Gibraltar FA for the award. We won 4 of our 3 league games the previous (the loss being that 8-0) and spirits were definitely high. Which meant one thing of course, we lost our next 2 games in the games in the league against Glacis & Europa Point, before redeeming ourselves with a thumping 4-0 win over Gibraltar Lions.

With 2 months of the league season to go this was the first opportunity I had to sit down with various members of the playing squad to discuss extending their contracts. I never had any issues negotiating my own contracts whilst I was a player, I never demanded much as I was pretty much just happy playing, and I wanted that mentality to rub off on the players, which I think it sort of did. Before I sat down with any of the playing squad, and coaching staff for that matter, I signed my own contract extension with the club when the chairman and I had a meeting on the afternoon after the Lions game. This was my first ever extension and maybe a bit naively I accepted the first offer that was presented to me, a 50 euro a week wage rise to 400 euro a week, as well as a clause that meant any other team would have to pay 80% of my remaining contract to hire me, which I didn’t even think about at the time, however a word of advice dear reader, remember this part as it comes in handy later on in the book. Back to discussions with the team and it got off on the worst foot possible. I sat down with midfielder Jose Luis Verdejo who I was certain would sign as he had played in every game, however when he sat down with me he refused my first offer, citing he wanted a higher basic wage as well as some other bonuses. He was polite enough about this though. So he went away and I said we’d pick up again later. Ivan Laboto, Carlos Sanchez, Felix, Jesus Camo, Michael Garcia and Francis Picardo all said the same thing, and basically refused to sign an extension.

So if you’re keeping track, that’s our starting left winger, left full back, right full back, goalkeeper, two central midfielders and 1 of our main forwards all saying no. My thought process at this time was maybe if I could get John Duarte, who at this time had managed 11 goals and 15 assists, most of his assists going to Michael Garcia, then the others would resign.

My meeting with Duarte went something like this:

Me - ‘John, hope you’re well, I want to discuss your contract, and maybe extend…

John as he cut me off – ‘Nah, I’m leaving at the end of the season, Lincoln will approach me and you can’t match what they’ll pay me’

Me – ‘Well maybe if we can discuss that?’

John – ‘No’

Me – ‘Are you sure? You’re our main guy here, I can’t afford to lose you?’

John – ‘No’

With that he left. Now as the years have gone I have learned that the team is the most important thing as a manager, but to my credit if I do say so myself, what I did next worked out for the better, for the most part anyway. For you see, when we got to training the next day, I did what my assistant manager Javier later said was a genius move. I hadn’t quite realised, but Johns attitude and general behavior had up until this point pissed off most of the team, so at our pre-match session before the first of our final 4 league games against Europa Point, I announced the team

‘Okay lads, standard set up 4-4-2. The team for tomorrow is Felix, Moto, Remorino and Frank as the back 4, Yepes on the right, Torres you’re on the left this time, Caballero and Carlos as always you’re in the middle’ Just then I saw Verdejo stir in his seat, he was the starting left winger and he thought he’d lost his place to Torres who was a good back up and this was his first start.

‘Up top as always Garica, and Jose Verdejo you’re playing off Garcia tomorrow and it’s something we’re going to discuss in the session following this team meeting.’ As the team left for the training pitch Duarte approached me

John – ‘Good joke Chris, Verdejo isn’t really starting at forward is he?

Me – ‘Yes actually he is, see you on the training pitch’

Side note, maybe me being a bit pedantic, but I absolutely hated being called Chris by my team. Duarte was the only one that did it. I thought to myself you’d never catch Beckham, Keane or Bruce calling Alex Ferguson Alex, or any England players in the team calling Bobby Robson Bobby or any of the invincible calling Arsene Wenger by his first name would you. I learned that it was him being his usual unprofessional self.

The result? A 2-0 win for us with Verdejo assisting Garcia for our opener and Garcia assisting Verdejo for our second. It was a master stroke and just the move we needed. Sticking with the same line up we played the semi final of the cup against Manchester and much like the Europa game, we came away with a win. Verdejo grabbing 2 and Garcia getting the third. These 2 clearly liked playing alongside each, and were going to be the starting forwards in the final 2 league games, as well as my first cup final, which was against Europa Point, who had beaten Lincoln Red Imps in their semi final. Whilst they did well to beat them, we were much more confident in beating Europa Point than we would’ve been playing Lincoln, or so I thought.

Lincoln were still reeling from that loss against Europa and I was expecting the inevitable backlash as we played them in our penultimate league game. Up until this point in the season, in the league Lincoln had a record of 25-0-0, a perfect 100 percent win rate.

After the game, Lincoln had a record of 25-0-1. Almost perfect.

We came out 2-1 winners with none other than Verdejo grabbing the winner, again. My decision to drop Duarte had most certainly paid off.

That win over meant we could finish no lower than second place in the league, as we held a 4 point advantage over third placed Gibraltar Lions, meaning the final day win over Gibraltar United was just for us to keep up the good form. The second placed finish meant we would be appearing in next seasons Europa League.

Cheers man, glad you enjoy so far

I had lived in Gibraltar for coming up to 4 months now. As Saint Jospehs were a semi pro team, we only trained 3 times a week, but my assistant manager Javier Casquero and I spent more time together after training. As there is only 1 stadium in Gibraltar, Victoria Stadium, and every team uses it as their home ground, we were given time slots to go there and train. When the team were off doing whatever they were doing when not training, or in John Duarte’s case being a massive prima donna, we discussed tactics, football philosophies and just generally hung out together. We did spend a lot of time together and it never got awkward or we never got sick of seeing each other, we really were in this together and bounced off each other really well.

During the season I tried to practice my Spanish as much as I could. Whilst most of my briefings and team talks were relayed to the team by Javier, I secretly thought that they would listen to him more then they’d listen to me, and maybe respect him more. With that in mind I really ramped up learning the lingo and by the time December rolled around, I was having conversations in Spanish, team talks, briefings and even speaking to people not connected to the club, such as fans after games, the odd media person in attendance and people in restaurants and what not.

The learning the language came in handy as I had my first taste of a falling out with a player. Well falling out may seem a bit harsh. The clubs HR lady came to tell me the transfer papers had come through from Cannons FC, another team in Gibraltar. When I questioned her on this she kind of just shrugged it off as if it was nothing. I looked at the sheet of paper in front me and there it was in black and white:

Transfer of Ayala, Jose Antonio, of Saint Josephs FC of Gibraltar to FC Cannons of Gibraltar.

Official transfer date 01/06/2017

This was revealed to me on the second of January 2017. At this time of the season, we’d played well enough and Ayala was an integral part of our play. We were second in the league, only 5 points behind leaders Lincoln Red Imps, so for him to be leaving for a team that was sitting second bottom really irked me. When I asked him about this, he said his agent had negotiated a good deal from Cannons, and his words not mine, playing for unknown manager Chris Irvine has been a painstakingly terrible experience. I asked him why does he think this? We’re second in the league, we’re playing well and Cannons were looking like going down? From his half arsed response I got that I am unprofessional, not able to motivate the team and there was no future at Saint Josephs. Fair enough I thought, we’ll see what happens during the next 6 months of the season. Until the end of the season however, Ayala was put in the reserves and I told him he won’t be anywhere near the first team. Petty I know, but this was the first real test of my nerve as a manager.

Despite Ayala’s best effort to derail our form, we continued picking up points, but also picking up the occasional bad result to boot. Case in point, 2 games in January. First up we played College Europa FC and played a 5-3 loss. It really was an end to end game, they scored, we scored, they scored again, we scored again. We went in at half time actually winning the game 3-2. But 7 second half minutes really took I tout of us. They equalised in the 67th minute, and by the 75th minute they were winning 5-3. Whilst there was enough there to win the game, we obviously let our concentration levels drop and were punished. There was absolutely no excuses for the next game though. Mons Caple FC, 5th in the league and I’d say at that time an even side with us. 30 minutes into the game there were 4 goals, all 4 scored by their forward Juan Pablo Pereira. The hair dryer treatment came at half time where for the first time, I think first time anyway, in my career I absolutely lost my shit with the team. I was expecting some sort of response, but the response I got were another 4 goals, only 1 more for Pereira, and a hat trick for his strike partner Michele Di Piedi. 8-0 and this is most definitely the lowest point of the season for us. We got the team in the next day and we made them do double training sessions, but not before making the team watching all 8 goals again, three times.

This reaction seemed to work as we had the Rock Cup coming up, Gibraltar’s version of the FA cup. It was a nice distraction from our league games, as we were drawn against lower league side Gibraltar Phoenix. We turned them over 3-0 which set up a nice run of games for us, in which we picked up more wins over Gibraltar Lions, Europa Point, Gibraltar United and Lynx FC, before we went down just, and I mean only just to Lincoln Red Imps who scored in the final minute of injury time. Whilst we were winning games, so were College Europa who had managed to overtake us and sat in second whilst we found ourselves third heading into the quarter final of the Rock Cup.

We had drawn this game against Mons Calpe and I was confident that if we continued where we left off, we’d be straight in the semi final, and hopeful we could avenge that absolute 8-0 drubbing.

You always remember your first of everything, your first football match, your first day of school, the first girl you kiss and so on. As this was something close to me and I wanted to keep a log of everything, I made a vow to myself to keep a log of every match I ever had as a football manager, and I’m proud to say that it was something I stuck to from the first match against Lynx right up to now. I don’t remember every single detail of every match, nobody could, but with my log of games, dates and scores, I also kept newspaper trimmings of my games as well as keeping a diary, I was able to jot down memorable moments, feelings and whatnot, which came in handy for my memoirs, which you are currently reading.

In my diary, on the date of 24th September 2016, I wrote down our opponents, the final scoreline and my own personal feelings of what it meant and how I felt, which I won’t put in much detail here, but I’m sure you can understand how it felt. I did this for every match I had.

Our opponents in my very first match as a manager, Lynx FC were the favourites to beat us, mainly as per the Sport Pesa, a Spanish footballer reporting publication, but what I saw in the team was a desire in to do well. It was as much a fresh start for them as it was me, despite a lot of them being there when they got promoted. None were more committed and dedicated to doing well than a mountain of a man, center half Francisco Marquez Heras, or Frank for short. This guy was what you’d call a friendly giant. Born in Seville in Spain, he’d been in Gibraltar all his playing career, he was 6 foot 4, around 18 stone, 16 of which looked like muscle, but he was one of the most professional players I’d ever met. In the build up to the game, he approached in me the dressing room when I’d got there before everyone else. He spoke broken English.

‘Boss, I will do well as I can, make big impression, make you look good’

This gesture made me feel immensely proud. Here was a player that was such a professional and took his game so serious, he was going out of his way to help me in my first game as a manager.

‘Thanks Frank, that’s really kind of you to say, but I am feeling nervous’

He could tell I was nervous

He replied with ‘Don’t be scared boss, football is just kids game played by men’

From then on he was the first name on my team sheet, and really helped me in my first season as a manager. I thanked him for his kind words, and told him in a way I hoped he would understand that I really appreciate him saying that, and I hoped we could work well together.

As the team made it’s way to the pitch, the opposition manager approached me, held his hand out and shook mine, but spoke in Spanish. I just smiled and said thanks, speak soon and walked off. My Spanish was coming along slowly but wasn’t anywhere near good enough to hold a conversation yet, but he smiled and went to his dugout. I looked around the stadium and guessed there were around 500 fans in attendance. After the game it was confirmed there were only 312.

As for my first taste of football management, I couldn’t have dreamt for a better start. As noted above you remember your first everything, and I remember this game as if it happened yesterday. As the game kicked off, we played the ball to our defence, just as was discussed the day before. Frank played a long ball forward, Durate outjumped the center half marking him and flicked the ball onto Garcia, a true route one big man little man football move, Garcia took a touch, stopped just as the defender went to make a tackle, and as he did Garcia played the ball along the edge of the box and central midfielder Steven Romero Garcia Luis, or just Steven as he wanted to be known, placed the ball under the keepers left. 39 seconds in and I’m winning my first game of football as a manager! I stayed calm and collected, and without celebrating wildly I just fist pumped the air, took a hi-five from my assistant Javier Casquero, and sat back in the dugout. The inevitable response from Lynx came and we soaked up a bit of pressure when almost 8 minutes later, the exact same passage of play happened again. Frank played a long ball up to Duarte, he outjumped his marker, not for the first, or the last time in this game, Garcia takes a touch except this time he’s through on goal, hits it with his right and it’s in the back of the net. 10 minutes in and it’s 2-0 to us!

Despite the scoreline, Lynx didn’t give in and went on the attack. With our structured approach they rarely threatened us from then on, and right on the stroke of half time Garcia got another for us. The 2 up top worked wonders again. Duarte took control of the ball, held it up long enough for Garcia to make a darting run forward, Duarte plays a lovely little through ball and he’s one on one with the keeper, 3-0 and the ref blew for half time! I thought to myself this football manager lark is quite easy!

My first ever half time team talk was just me telling the guys how proud I was, how happy I am at the score and how well we’ve played. We brought on a couple of subs and just stuck to the game plan of soaking up pressure and playing to our strengths. The 3-0 half time score didn’t change and we saw out the second half without any worries. I wasn’t going to get ahead of myself after this win, but after our next game against Manchester United 62 (I wonder where they got the inspiration for that name from?) I couldn’t help but get excited. We picked up where we left off as we thumped them 5-0 with Duarate showing both sides of his personality. He scored 4 of the 5, and assisted Garcia for the other goal. After the game I pulled Duarte to one side and told him I thought he was superb in front of goal and that with performances like this we’ll never need to worry about relegation.

‘You were superb in front of goal John, keep it up and we’ll never have to worry about relegation’ I told him, in what I thought was a well earned bit of praise

‘Meh, relegation, even if this club goes down I’ll still top the scoring charts’ he said with a look of pure disgust ‘A bit of advice from an experienced head (he was 3 years younger than me) You should be having these man up chats with the defence, they’re piss poor, I’ll keep doing my thing, you worry about them’ and off he went.
It made me a bit angry at first, but then as time went on I just got used to his arrogant self centered ways. He also conveniently forgot to mention that in our opening 2 games, we’d scored 8 goals, okay he had 4 of them, but we kept 2 clean sheets, so I think the defence were doing their bit early on.

As the days went on, we carried on training and working on the things that got us 2 wins and 8 goals, we didn’t change anything up just yet. The next 2 games of our season ended with a 3-0 win against College Europa FC, before we conceded our first goal albeit in a 3-1 win over Mons Calpe in the league. These 2 wins saw us sitting top of the league after 4 games. I wasn’t concerned when we were soundly beaten 2-1 by Gibraltar Lions though no one can expect to win every game by 3 goals, but we were still top at the end of my first competitive month of football, with a record of 5 played, 4 wins and that 1 loss. We were level on points with Lincoln Red Imps who had won the league the last 12 years and are the only professional team in Gibraltar.

The end of my first month and I couldn’t have been happier, proud and delighted at our early season form. The main thing was going to be keeping this up.

Whilst on holiday in Spain we went on a trip to a small country off the south coast of Spain, Gibraltar. On our way there, my father revealed something about him I never know. Before hanging up his boots as a player, he had spent 1 season as a player / coach at a team in Gibraltar, and had always said he’d liked to go back. Whilst there we went to go to see the team he played for, Saint Josephs FC in a pre season friendly against Hellas Verona.

After the match, a 2-0 win for the visitors, we got talking to the clubs directors and chairman, who were all very friendly with my father. I told the chairman, a man named Stuart Rodriguez about my current situation and we had a good couple of hours of talking.

After a week of sight seeing, I got back to The Victoria Stadium and saw the team lose to Boavista’s reserve side. I could tell this side were struggling defensively and the assistant manager looked quite dejected on the sideline. After the game we got talking to the chairman again, except this time he asked me to join him in his office for a chat. I didn’t think much of it at first.

The chat was quite relaxed, the chairman was clearly passionate about his team, he told me about the new strips for the season, a new 3 year long sponsorship deal and if they could stay in the league that season, they may just be turning professional. We again discussed my background as a semi-pro in Vegas, my almost but not quite getting picked in the MLS draft, as well as how my experience of working as Doc’s assistant had given me the itch to become a manager sometime in the future. On that Stuart said he felt that an outsider would help bring a fresh outlook on football here, and he also said that an outsider, an unknown could just be the spark that kept this team in the league. As I was leaving my father walked in and carried on talking as I went down to the fans area.

Later that evening in a restaurant my father had said that Stuart had mentioned that he’d be interested in giving me the position of manager, if it was something I would consider. The thought hadn’t actually crossed my mind, my mind had been on returning to Vegas as Docs assistant, but I thought well what the hell why not. The next day I met with Stuart and we discussed the position, and said it is only fair I apply officially, so I sent an email, cover letter and my small CV.

Two days had passed by without hearing from Stuart. During that time I was becoming more and more excited but anxious about this job. I had also convinced myself that he had other applicants, more experienced and more local guys that he was interviewing, but just as I was getting ready to go sightseeing or whatever the plan was that day, I got an email notification on my phone. I can still remember the email word for word:

Chris,
Thank you for your time the other day. After thinking things over, discussing this with your dad as well as taking your own experience and ideas into consideration, I am happy to say please see attached document, an offer of employment to be the new first team manager of Saint Joseph’s football Club.

Chris, you are the man I want to save my team from relegation. Take your time thinking it over, but be mindful the season starts against Lynx FC in 4 days time.

Speak soon.

Stuart Rodriguez
Saint Josephs Chairman

My first job offer to be a football manager! At first I was a bit annoyed that he had discussed this with my dad, I didn’t want to be known as Chris Irvines son, I just wanted to be my own Chris Irvine, but at the same time I couldn’t quite believe it, so I raced down to where my parents were to tell them the news. They were quite as shocked as me, but very supportive. My dad was extremely supportive, of course he knew what I was in for moving to a foreign country, he’d done it from France to Canada then to Gibraltar and back again, but he spoke English and French, I spoke the same 2 languages, but I wasn’t sure how many people, if any in Gibraltar spoke those languages.
I signed the contract electronically and emailed it back.

My first official day as manager was 8th September 2016. Saint Josephs FC were the perfect team for me in many ways. The Primera division consisted of 10 teams of which the bottom 2 went down. The perfect thing for me was, that no matter how badly we played, the pressure was never on Saint Josephs as they were expected to go straight back down. So with my cynicism hat on, it wouldn’t matter if we got spanked every week, but with my optimist hat on, the pressure would be on every other team as they would always be favourites for the games, so I could tell the team they could play without any added pressure. That was my plan at least. Throw in the fact that this is a small town country, the stadium holds 3,000 fans, but I saw first hand that only the main stand was ever open, holding around 650 fans. I felt that there wouldn’t be no added pressure from the fans because of this.

On my first day I was still checked into my hotel a few blocks away from the ground. In my excitement I had completely forgot to consider where I would be living whilst here! Not one to let details slip, Stuart had told me he was willing to pay my accommodation for my first year here, which I couldn’t believe! Turns out however, which I found out around a year or so later, is that he had bought an apartment for his son and his new wife, but when his son had left his bride at the altar and ran off with a bridesmaid, Miguel was so disgusted (Stuart and his sons ex-fiancé’s dad were friends from school and had multiple business ventures together) he had actually disowned his son for all the shame he had brought on the Rodriguez family. So the flat was mine for the time being.

After that I was introduced to various people, the director of football, coaching staff, catering and HR. The clubs assistant manager was Javier Casquero who I had watched from the stands for the 2 games had made time to sit down with me and go over various reports on the team and other things like scout reports.

Once the pleasantries of my first morning were out of the way I met the first team out on the training pitch, you know my first ever time meeting a team as a fully fledged first team manager, and it couldn’t have gone any worse. It went something like this:

‘Afternoon lads, how is everyone?’

Silence. Nothing. Not even a peep.

I look at and nod at chap standing in a tracksuit, who gives me the thousand yard stare me blankly.

It didn’t take long to realise they don’t speak English. Obviously. So how best to communicate to them?

I blurt out ‘Me. Chris. Your. New. Boss. Amigos’ in that stupid dumb downed way of talking English speaking people do when they’re speaking to a non-English speaker

Still nothing. I was half expecting to see tumbleweed roll past

‘Me. Show. You. How. To. Play. Football’. I took a nearby ball and kicked it towards goal. Boom, top left corner.

‘See. Me. Good’

Absolutely nothing from the team. Not one of them said a thing. I then yelled ‘For fuck sake lads give me a fucking clue!’ before I heard ‘Hahah you’re funny’

Turns out the assistant manager is actually fluent in multiple languages, Spanish and English being 2 of them. He went on to tell me the full squad speaks Spanish, a couple do speak English but the majority of the squad are Spanish players. He turned out to be a pretty good translator and had a plethora (great word!) of tactical knowledge and ideas. He would become my most trusted colleague in my time at Saint Josephs, he was 39 at the time, was experienced enough with 6 years of coaching experience at Las Palmas in Spain and this was his first assistant manager job, and it wouldn’t be his last either. A steady hand and the right type of person I needed at that time, he helped me both in the club and outside of working hours.

As for our tactics that first season, I didn’t want to over complicate things, and this season was about one thing, staying in the league, nothing else. We kept it simple, 4-4-2 with 2 flat banks of 4, very structured so each player had 1 role each game, and really looking back, we just played to our strengths, namely getting long diagonal balls up to the front 2 of target man (and all round pain in the ass!) John-Paul Duarte and poacher type player Michael Garcia. These 2 played well with each other, knew each other’s games inside and out and were the perfect big man little man combo.

The next few days flew by, and by the time of our first game against Lynx FC (great team name!), I had a team talk in mind. We’d worked on a few things in training, mainly touching on how we’re going to be getting the ball to the front 2, and what I wanted from each of the team individually.

I couldn’t wait to take charge of my first match as a football manager!

To most people, I’m known as Chris Irvine, but my real name is Cristoff Alexander Irvine Junior. My father is a native of Paris, and my mother was born and raised in Quebec, Canada. My father was a professional footballer, my mother spent many years as a translator for the French FA, and that is how they met. The story goes that my father was negotiating a new contract with the team he played most his of full career for, Red Star FC based in Paris, and the new director of footballing operations, today that role is simply known as the director of football, he was Spanish, and my father spoke French and is fluent in English. Hence the need for a translator. I don’t know why my mother was in France, but it’s good that she was as they hit it off and fast forward to 1986, in the Winnipeg general infirmary, young Cristoff junior was born.

By this time my father had quit full time football in France to concentrate on being a part time footballer in the Canadian football system. It was his life long dream to retire in Canada and as such, managed to get a free transfer to FC Cavalry based in Calgary. My mother had also quit translating and got a part time job when they moved to Winnipeg. Football wasn’t and in many ways still isn’t that big a deal in Canada. Whenever I’d hang out with friends or family and I’d mention football, most of the time people started talking about the NFL. Now don’t get me wrong, I do like the NFL (go Chiefs!) but with a professional footballing father, it was really only me and him that were interested. My interest piqued big time when in 1996 when, at 10 years old, we went on a family vacation to England. My father had distant relatives in England in a city called Newcastle Upon Tyne. I’ll never forget the minute I got off the plane and met my long lost uncle Lou

‘Hi Chris great to see you! Oh my, you must be Chris junior, welcome to the Toon!’

At this time I didn’t even know where about in England I was and what the Toon was

‘What’s the Toon? I said

‘It’s where the Geordies live’ Uncle Lou replied

‘The Geordies? What’s a Geordie?’

‘Someone from the Toon of course!’

Still to this day I don’t understand what that means, but anyway it was quite obvious this was a city full of football fanatics, and the team just so happened to be top of the Premier League. The manager at the time was stark raving lunatic called Kevin Keegan, and after watching the repeat of match of the day from the night before, Newcastle beat the Tottenham Hotspurs 3-1, I was immediately hooked on this guy with long curly hair. We managed to go see Newcastle play and that’s when I knew I had fallen in love with the beautiful game.

Back home in Canada, I made it on to the high school soccer team. I wasn’t bad, but I wasn’t good. After graduating, and getting a place at Michigan University to study sports science, I had it in my mind that I was going to the next big footballer coming out of Canada. Once in the Michigan Wildcats team, we won back to back to back Big 10 League’s in my 3 years there, I was selected to be an all American, despite being Canadian. My stats in the 3 years I spent at Michigan were 58 games, all as starting left back, 26 assists, 11 goals, 18 man of the match performances and Big 10 League MVP in my second season. I was touted as a potential late first round / upper second round pick in the MLS draft. Unfortunately for me, I went undrafted in the 2006 draft, and was at a dead end as a player. With a degree in sports science, 3 quality years as a player I couldn’t get a job in the MLS, so I had to do the next best thing.

My coach at Michigan, Doc Spencer had got the head coach job at lower league side the Las Vegas Mobsters. In the next 8 years, I was the Mobsters starting left back for the first 3 years, then I was club captain for the following 5 and even doubled up as club physio for the final year I was there. We didn’t win any cups, but I genuinely think I would’ve enjoyed my time in Vegas more than if I had got into the MLS. Every day was fun, if we lost we still held our heads high, when we won we partied all night it was magical. In my final year as a player, I went for a 50/50 loose ball, and the attacker missed the ball but caught my ankle perfectly. I’ll never forget the day of the operation

‘Mr Irvine, there’s good news and bad news’ the doctor said

‘Good news first I guess’

‘Well, you’ll definitely walk again, your ankle won’t be 100% its former self, but you will walk’

‘And the bad news?

‘You’re never going to play again’

Talk about being blunt. He literally told me I’ll never play again and left the room. I was 28 coming up to my 29th birthday, and right back to square one. Okay so I had nearly 10 years playing experience, as well as that degree I’ve got, but nowhere to go with it. I didn’t wallow in self pity, I just concentrated on my recovery, I still held my job as the Mobsters physio part time but the desire to play was still there.

During the recovery phase of nearly a year, I spent a lot of time with Coach Spencer, and took in a lot of games and was his unofficial assistant manager. I relayed his instructions to the team, took training sessions and gave my advice and opinion during, before and after games. Being in a position of responsibility of a football team really gave me the itch to try my hand at managing, so it was decided between myself and Doc that once this season as finished, I was going on a holiday with my folks, and from then I would return as his official assistant manager full time.

However, I would never return to Vegas.

They said I was the best. If I was narcissistic, I’d agree with them without questioning it, but the numbers don’t lie. FIFA have this hall of fame thing, whereby they calculate your standing based on the competitions you’ve won as a manager, and each competition is given so many points. The World Cup by default is given the highest number of points, but I don’t know exactly how many points each competition is worth, but just looking at the hall of fame, you can see why some people call me the best. But if you’re reading this, my memoir, you’d already know who I am and what I’m about.

In my home town the French speaking people there, of which there many bilingual folk, they call me Lé Champiὸn, the Champion, but the younger people who don’t speak much French, simply call me the best. Of course, to be called the best, someone needs to have worked their way up to such a standing with in the footballing community, and I’m no different.

You’ve picked up my autobiography because you know my name form 1 medium or another, and you’re either interested in my story, or you’re part of a book club and my memoir is the book of the week. Either way, my name, as you know is Chris Irvine. For many years I’ve been a football manager. I’m from Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. And this is my story.



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This is a story detailing my save on FM. It's going to be in an autobiography style. Updates will be at least once a week. Feedback and criticism is more than welcomed.

As always a fantastic write up mate! Pray and hope you beat the drop! Nothing worse than a relegation!

I like your description. I'm still on 17 dude.

Good start, I've always had a soft spot for Wednesday.

Absolutely incredible mate!! Thank you!

Good write up pal

Awesome mate thank you!!

Anyone able to see my request from a few months ago? Links in spoilers to stop clogging up the thread. Thanks in advance!!

Oh My God! They're better than I imagined man! Thanks for third kit too, incredible!!

Can I get home and away kits for FC Goveia?

Badge -

Kit Style like Real Madrids:



Home purple, away white please

Shirt manufacturer - Addidas -

Sponsor - Fly Emirates -

Thank you!

Apologies for the lack of an update on this, I haven't had much time to post updates, but I've played a lot of this challenge and can say I've actually completed it, but as I have got literally hundreds of screen shots, I haven't got the time to go through them all to post on here.

But I will be back with another thread very, very soon

Good update mate, keep it up

That's the thing with players 33+, they seem to get injured a bit more frequently. It is what it is though we plod along.

Welcome back man! Can't wait to see how this unfolds from here

We kicked off the next part of our season with bad news as star striker Zidane is out for up to 5 weeks, bad times this as he’s our main scoring outlet.



We did however continue playing well and picking up points, as we beat Stabaek in the league, Mjondalen in the cup to progress to the quarter final against Tromso, we drew with Rosenborg 0-0 in a game we absolutely dominated from start to finish, 18 shots on target but their keeper played a blinder to round out June







News on my upcoming contract end broke, and I don’t comment but between you and me, I;m not staying after this season at Lillestrom, no matter what happens



The wins kept coming, as FK Jerv, Stromgodset, IK Stat all felt our wrath before we went down at home to Odds, that leaves us still top with 39 points and 16 played





It was at this point the Euro’s of 2028 happened and Belgium won it with a final victory over Italy.



With all the good that’s happening, it was bound to happen that something bad would come up.





Not now Zidane, not now, we’re halfway through the season. I try talking him out of it but he's not having any of it

We recorded back to back losses as we went down to Fredrikstad before thumping Tromso in the cup to put us in the semi







We’re playing Aelsunds in the semi, the same team we beat in the final 2 years ago.

Relegation favorites Goroud got thumped 3-0, before we played out a 3 all draw with Tromso before Zidane’s strike partner Ingrand tells me he wants to join Levante



I’m not in the mood for this, but at least Ingrand sees the bigger picture for now



Mjoldalen were our next victims before Molde and Valarenga beat us in the league, before we edged the cup semi against Aaelsunds to put ourselves in the final against Fredrikstad







Finishing off September was a win over Bodo/Glint that sees us have a 6 point advantage at the top of the league with 6 to go



With 6 to go and a nice 6 point advantage, surely the league is ours to lose?

Before the final 6 games however it’s random news time now. As you can see, Sampdoria won Serie A last season



They’ve got a new manager leading them into their title defence


Next update will be the final 6 games and the cup final.

Thanks for reading.

We kicked off the new season in great style, 5-0 over Fredrikstad, and giving me the first 3 of 11 points I need.



Another 5 goal showing followed, as Zidane grabbed a hat trick. 6 points from 11, 3 games to go



Another 3 points came next against promoted side Goroud. 9 from 11, 2 games to go.



2 points dropped, or 1 point gained? Either way Zidane was our savior with a 90th minute equaliser as we drew with Tromso, meaning it’s 10 points from 11, and I just need to avoid defeat in the next game to be safe, for now



A cup game came next, as we beat lower league side Asker 3-1, and we’re drawn against another lower league side Ottesad which will hopefully see us progress even further.







There was no doubt we’d hit the 11 point target set by the board, as Mjoldalen felt Zidane’s wrath as he scored 4 in a 5-1 win.





So with that win I’d met the boards target, not that it was ever in doubt really, but from here I can push on with making sure this season is a hell of a lot better than last.

Our first big derby of the season came against SK Brann, and Zidane once again proved his weight in gold as we won 2-1 away to our bitter rivals.



Rounding out the first month of the new season, and unsurprisingly the main man Zidane grabs the player of the month, averaging 2 goals a game as he scores 12 in 6



No prizes for guessing the manager of the month either



May saw us carry on winning in the cup, 4-0 over Ottestad, we then beat league favorites Molde 3-2 away, with Pederson responding well to my aggressive half time team talk



Bodo/Glint didn’t turn up as we thumped them 7-0, Zidane grabbing 5(!) of the 7 goals and gets himself a perfect 10 rating to boot.





Valarenga were our next victims as we beat them 4-2, Zidane getting a brace before we dropped points at home to Viking FC, with Zidane again proving pivotal with an 89th minute euqaliser, his second last minute goal for us so far



However his strike partner Ingrand came off during that game, and is out for up to 9 weeks.



Lets hope that this injury doesn’t disrupt us too much, and that Perez can stay fit and play alongside Zidane, or we’re going to have to change things up a bit.

We continued our run in the cup, with a 1-0 away win over Asane to put us in the 4th round





So that brings us to the end of May, with us clearly the outstanding team sitting first, having played 10 games, winning 8 and not losing





We’re drawn against Mjoldalen in the cup, we’re not going to lose to them after Zidane put 4 past them in the league, and they’re bottom of the league so will probably put a weakened side out.

Heading into June will be the next squad announcement for my Australia side and our World Cup qualifying campaign, as well as the next set of games in Norway.

Thanks for reading.