OleDK Posted March 5, 2023 Share Posted March 5, 2023 Hungerford - Against all odds Four years ago I posten what I expected to be a long term save with FM19 with Hungerford But after a few months I had to end it due to many work hours and limited time for FM 😥 Now I will restart it with FM23 👍 one thing hasn’t changed in the period - Hungerford is once again in the bottom (IRL) of Vanarama National League South (England Tier 6) and still has a lot to improve…. https://www.thenationalleague.org.uk/match-info/tables?table_id=d-5660542 I hope I can hold on to this save for a longer time than last time and everyone is welcome to follow my task to improve the status at Hungerford in a longterm save 2 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted March 5, 2023 Author Share Posted March 5, 2023 Here we go - new manager appointed Hungerford has survived six seasons in National League South with a 6th and 7th place as the best results despite being one of the smallest clubs in the league Hungerford is a small town (5,869 inhabitants) between Reading and Swindon in Berkshire. Hungerford’s facilities are quite humble to say the least. Home matches are played at Bulpit Lane (capacity 3,034 - more than half of the people who lives in Hungerford can see the home matches ) training facilities are basic and youth facilities are poor. The Board (represented by Chairman Patrick Chambers) was pretty realistic in their demands to me. Survive in the league and don’t embarass us in the cups…. Here’s my new boss: presenting Patrick Chambers (seems like a very nice chap): 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted March 5, 2023 Author Share Posted March 5, 2023 (edited) Pre-season 2022: The squad I “inherited” from the previous manager was not that bad in my opinion. We have a very talented keeper on loan from Bristol Rovers (Jed Ward, 19) and a competent winger with 64 league matches for Eastbourne (Joel Rollinson, 23) but apart from that I expect to say goodbye to half of the squad - perhaps keep 10-12 players in total from the original squad. There was nothing left in our wage budget (£ 4,392 per week) so I needed to ship off some players before I could sign other players. Seven players left us on a free transfer in pre-season and on player was sent on loan with a 90% salary refund. Now we have some space My transfer strategi is to sign under-23 players on free (also necessary as no transfer funds are available) and preferably players that can turn into first team regulars within a year or two. Following this strategi, we signed the following players for our first-team squad: Renedi Masampu, DLC/WBL, 22, Birmingham Ryan Maclean, DLC/DMC/MC, 20, ex-Watford Brandon Channell, DC, 19, ex-Bournemouth James Matthews, DRC, 20, Welling George Sheridan, DC/DMC/MC, 20, Aldershot Andres De Gracia, DMC/MC, 19, Derby Lewis Lynn, DMC/MC, 19, Stevenage Reece Miller, AMC/ST, 21, Aldershot Jovel Jackson-Davis, ST, 19, ex-Nottingham Forest Two of the new signings: The weaknesses in the original squad was in defence, in particular on left back and I was happy that the new players could improve the overall quality in these areas and the position depth had improved immensely. We could do with a better backup goalkeeper but it is not an urgent matter. My staff is of various quality but ok on this level. Best staff is my Assistant manager and HOYD We have some fine wingers so I start with a 4-2-4 as preferred tactic: In Pre-season we played a number of matches agains lower ranked clubs and managed to win them all My new friendship with Patrick Chambers as chairman is probably going to end soon…. We are ready⚽️ Edited March 5, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted March 7, 2023 Author Share Posted March 7, 2023 (edited) Autumn 2022: The first League match of the season is always important. A defeat can weaken our confidence but a win can boost your players and provided optimism to players and fans. This season our first match was a home match against Concord Rangers. Luck went our way as Claudio Ofosu converted a penalty kick to goal in 18th minute and substitute striker Reece Miller secured the win with a 2-0 goal in second half. A good win and a comforting season start for us 👍 We also played very well in our second league match but were unlucky to lose 3-2 away to Dover. Following this defeat we didn’t look back. 12 league matches in a row with no defeats ! The fine run left us sitting in first place after one third of the season ended two points ahead of Havant & Waterlooville (and 20 points ahead of the relegation zone…). A major surprise and the Board was very delighted with the performance These fine results can despite of a five-week injury period to our star player Joel Rollinson. In his absense, Leighton Thomas (23-year old winger from Cayman Islands) came in a made an astonishing effort. Good to see a player take use of the chances provided! We also had our go in the FA Cup - with very few expectations to us from the Board - so no pressure at all. Our first match (2nd Qual. Round) gave us a 2-1 win away against Hanwell from Southern Premier South and we also had a favorable draw in 3rd Qual. Round against Bognor Regis from Isthmian Premier at home at Bulpit Lane but despite a 16-2 shot statistic we actually were a bit lucky to end up with a 1-1 draw However, in the replay match in Bognor Regis we took our “revenge” with a smashing 5-0 win after a hat-trick by our young striker Shae Hutchinson. The win qualified us to an away match against Woking (placed mid-table in National League) and the match showed that we still did not have the strength to beat an National League team. Defeated 2-1 (with a late goal by Sammy Ompreon) and no more FA Cup for us this season. We were still trying to strengthen our squad and in the period we signed the following players for our first-team squad: - Kai Garande, 19, DL/WBL, ex-Charlton - Junior Paiva, 19, DR/DL/WBR, ex-QPR - Henry Njonjo, 19, MC/AMC, ex-Bristol Rovers - Reece Nicholas-Davies, 17, MRL/AMRL, Derby - Shae Hutchinson, 21, AMC/ST, Farnborough I was paricularly happy about the signing of Reece Nicholas-Davies as a good prospect for the future with fine technical attributes and Shae Hutchinson as a possible rotation player in attack. A great beginng of my first season Edited March 7, 2023 by OleDK 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted March 12, 2023 Author Share Posted March 12, 2023 (edited) Winter 2022/23: We managed to stay undefeated for a total of 23 league matches 💪 until defeated. Our defence was impressively solid and still we managed to score - not a lot but enough to secure points in all matches. The great stability made us sit in top of the league with a seven point lead to Havant & Waterlooville. But of course it should end at some point. Farnborough ended our unbeaten run with a 2-1 win after a lousy performance from our side We were still trying to improve our squad by finding young players on free transfers mostly on non-contracts and therefore can be signed by other clubs on a free transfer. We lost talented backup player, George Sheridan, to Hornchurch on that account but instead we signed Charlie Noakes (20, DLC) from Chelmsford, Eden Sears (20, DC) from Bath and Nathan Tormey (22, AMRL) from Bromley to strengthen our squad. Charlie Noakes made it to our starting lineup as Sears and Tormey are backup players at the moment. One of our young players, 20-year old Andrés de Gracia was developing very well. First team regular with good technique and very good ability to spot a pass and create chances. He is turning into a key player for our side if his development continues. When it comes to development: we seem to be having a great winger talent on the way from the youth team With 1/3 left of the season we were still in top of the league ahead of Havant & Waterlooville and Ebbsfleet as our primary contenders for first place and promotion to Vanarama National League. We were definitely heading towards the playoffs and the best result ever in the history of Hungerford Town FC Jed Ward was our best rated player. I was trying to convince Bristol Rovers to extend the loan to next season but they were not convinced… Furthermore I was struggling to extend Joel Rollinson’s contract so next season’s squad could end less qualitative then the present squad Edited May 7, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted March 18, 2023 Author Share Posted March 18, 2023 (edited) Spring 2023: FA Trophy is the “small” cup tournament only for Non-league clubs (tier 5-8 in the English football pyramid - Hungerford is placed in 6th tier). We had never had much success in the FA Trophy. We had been engaged in the cup 13 times and our best results so far had been two 3rd Round defeats (in 2013-14 to Gosport and last year to Weymouth). We succeeded in making a new club record after winning over Havant & Waterlooville in 2nd Round and Dover in 3rd Round until facing Welling in 4th Round. Two early goals by Niko Muir and Claudio Ofosu gave us a fine win and a place in 5th Round (final 16 clubs) for the first time in club history However, that’s where it ended Brackley from Vanarama North won 2-1 in a pretty close encounter but still: we could be quite proud of our cup run! We continued our fine results in Vanarama South but my players did seem to become more tired than previously and injuries started becoming more or less regularly so with a fine lead in the table 12 points ahead with six matches left I decided to tweak our tactics with the intension to lower the match intensity. Bad idea The following two matches were lost so with four matches left our lead was suddenly reduced to only six points and with second placed Havant & Waterlooville in our next match….😱 So we went back to our usual draining tactic but our momentum were gone. We certainly didn’t play well but after a good fight we managed to secure a 0-0 result and thereby maintaining our six point lead 💪 Our next match gave us a 1-0 win in Chelmsford and this meant that we had our fate in our own hands as a draw at home against Dulwich Hamlet would secure the club’s first promotion ever to Vanarama National League 👍 but we were still struggling to get back om track. We lost 1-0 but Havant and Waterlooville didn’t win their match so Hungerford Town wins the league and gains promotion to National League!!! The promotion made the Board provide us with a larger wage budget so now I could make a deal with Joel Rollinson for a new season (on a £500 per week contract) and after many attempts I persuaded Bristol Rovers to send Jed Ward to us for an extra season (paying 60% of wage - an increase from 50% this season). Now all of our profiles in our squad from 2022/23 was ready for 2023/24 👍 We had signed a few players for our first team squad in the spring too: Sam Odaudu, DCR, 20, from Dartford (5 league matches earlier this season) Latrell Humphrey-Ewers, 18, from Oxford (21 league matches earlier in this season) Gerald Muchechetere, AML/ST, 18, from Oxford (24 league matches earlier in this season) I was getting more and more happy about our squad depth and the early report from our youth academy had made me hopeful to welcome a fine young winger for our squad: but something must have gone wrong in the meantime….🤨 so i must be back on the transfer market again…. We ended the season with a £21k deficit and there were steady rumours going on about a possible takeover of the club. Let’s see what comes out of that… Btw: I won the Manager of the Year prize 😀 Edited March 18, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted March 19, 2023 Author Share Posted March 19, 2023 (edited) Pre-season 2023: I really thought we had a deal, I really thought we had a deal….but apparantly we didn’t As I wrote in the previous update I had made an agreement with Bristol Rovers to extend the loan of our great goalkeeper Jed Ward for an extra season but the day before the extension period was to begin Jed Ward rejected the loan offer 😩. Apparantly his ambition now was to become first-choice goalkeeper at Bristol Rovers in competition with 32-year old James Belshaw. I was extremely disappointed but must have respect for his ambitions. Good luck, Jed 👍Instead I needed to secure a contract for the season with last season’s backup keeper, Marcus Beauchamp in order not to loose both keepers but also started a search among free transfers for a talented keeper who could replace Jed Ward as good as possible. My search for a new keeper ended with this guy: 18-year old Beau Hudd from West Bromwich youth academy. Not far from the level of Marcus Beauchamp and not at all at Jed Ward’s level but I think he has the potential to reach the level required for National League. Other new players for our first team squad: Will Owens, DL/WBL, 19, from Oxford Owen Cochrane, DR, 18, from Stevenage (last season 24 league matches for Chippenham on loan) Declan Hutchings, DC/MC, 18, from Shrewsbury Alfie Matthew, AMRLC/ST, 21, from Braintree (42 league matches last season) Baylin Johnson, AMRL/ST, 18, from Bournemouth Especially Baylin Johnson seems very talented and a man for the future but all new signings will have their part of the matches this season. We let 24-year old winger Leighton Thomas left on a free transfer to Margate but apart from him and Jed Ward the first team squad of last season was still here. After the promotion to National League the Board had the idea to tell me what style of play we should play. Defensively solid football, possession football and high-tempo pressure football. Well not far from our previous style of football so perhaps we could agree on that the othe expectations were minimal. Attempt to avoid relegation from National League and be competitive in the cup tournaments. I’m okay with these expectations. Due to higher standards in National League, Bulpit Lane was no longer good enough so the Board decided to rent Winklebury Football Complex in Basingstoke (25 miles from Hungerford) and to invest £712k in expanding Bulpit Lane from 3,000 to 4,400 Expected return to Bulpit Lane: April next year….(meaning that 21 of 23 home matches this season will be played in Basingstoke). The Board also announced a new partnership with Potters Bar Town from Isthmian League (tier 7) a good supplement to our existing partnership with Thatcham (tier 8) so that youth players could get valuable match experience in Isthmian league at Potters Bar. No more talking and waiting - come on National League we’re ready! Edited May 7, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted March 25, 2023 Author Share Posted March 25, 2023 (edited) Autumn 2023 (National League) Hungerford Town FC’s first ever match in Vanarama National League was to be played at Huish Park in Yeovil. Yeovil Town finished 16th in National League last season so a good test for us regarding our chances to survive in the league this season. (Board expectations was only to try to survive in the league). Beau Hudd kept clean sheet in his debut match and winger Claudio Ofosu became match winner as we started our season with a fine 1-0 victory Next match was both our home debut in National League but also our first match at rented Winklebury Football Complex. No less than 3,368 spectators (new club record - former record attendance was 1,684 against Sudbury in 1989) witnessed our home team win 2-0 against King’s Lynn after two goals from young Gerald Muchechetere. What a start 👍 After the fantastic start of the season, it became everyday for us. It was increasingly difficult for us to make results (worst result was a 0-3 defeat away in Aldershot) but we did manage to win a few matches so altogether we were doing okay. We signed a young striker from Ireland (Dylan Gavin, 20, ex-Charlton, played 20 matches on loan at Tonbridge last season) and a young midfielder in Charlie Veevers (18, ex-Swansea youth player) to make the squad better in depth - and also two players for the future. Our 31-year old vice-captain and regular right back Rhys Tyler also made a club record with his 223th league match for Hungerford Town 💪 and our very talented profile in midfield Andrés de Gracia decided to switch nationality to Colombian 🇨🇴 (he also has the possibility to represent Spain). Perhaps a possible Colombian U23 player? After 16 matches switching between wins, draws and losses we were sitting comfortably in the league standings in 11th position. Four points behind the Playoff zone but also only five points ahead of relegation zone so a very close league at the moment. Beau Hudd had grown considerably as our first choice goalkeeper and two other teenagers, Gerald Muchechetere and Baylin Johnson were pushing hard for places in our starting lineup. Edited March 25, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted March 26, 2023 Author Share Posted March 26, 2023 (edited) Winter 2023/24 (National League) In FA Cup we had started out in 4th Qual. Round with an easy 4-0 win over Bath from National League South - a clear evidence of our development as we were in same league last season. The win meant that Hungerford Town had qualified for First Round for the first time since 1979-80 but with a difficult opponent in First Round - away against Crawley from League Two. We were sooo close to defeating Crawley 😩 we were ahead 2-1 until 89th minute (ahead 2-0 after 10 minutes) but the pressure from Crawley was immense and in the end we crumbled after being reduced to 10 in 75th minute). A very costly red card to Baylin Johnson the result meant that we should play a replay match at Winklebury a bit later. Once again we were fighting well. Got ahead 1-0 in the middle of first half Crawley scored an equalizer a few minutes later and were the best team and produced many chances - until 110th minute in overtime when we once again were pressed too far back in field. Actually we did play better than Crawley in the replay match but we have a young squad with little experience and in the end they were more clever than us 😡 We signed Tommy Jackson (19, from Stoke’s youth team) as a new backup keeper for Beau Hudd who kept developing rapidly. With Hudd and Jackson we had both quality and potential im goal 💪 Not a lot in quality difference between our keepers: A good thing that we could attract young quality players from other clubs as there definitely NOT is anything coming up from our own youth Department this season…. We played our FA Trophy matches with Tommy Jackson in goal and he turned out to be quite a penalty specialist. We ended in penalty kicks after 0-0 draws both away against Billericay and away against Scarborough but Tommy Jackson saved us from embarrassing defeats both times and qualifying us to 5th Round just like last season - more about that in my next update. Our major problem - like in the two goalless cup draws - was to score goals. Last season’s top goal scorer Niko Muir was not as effective anymore at 30 years and we also struggled due to our quite defensive tactic. We played 12 matches in December and January with a total goal score of 6-6. The Board also wasn’t too impressed about the entertainment so I decided to tweak our tactics and it seemed to help and secured a 4-1 home win over Gateshead. Several players in the first-team was developing rapidly especially Andrés de Gracia in midfield, Baylin Johnson in attack and Beau Hudd in goal - definitely players we could build further on We were almost impossible to score against and we did increase our number of points enough to be far away from the relegation zone and just below the Playoff zone (placed 12th) so we were definitely good enough to play in this league - and perhaps more entertaining in future Our chairman has decided to retire (63 years old) - who knows what influence that can have on our future ? Edited March 26, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
dtown1414 Posted March 26, 2023 Share Posted March 26, 2023 Nice read. Good luck the rest of the way! 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted March 31, 2023 Author Share Posted March 31, 2023 (edited) Spring 2024 (National League) As mentioned in my last update we had won two FA Trophy matches after penalties due to goalless draws in 120 minutes. Incredibly, the same thing occured in our 5th Round match against Farnborough. Same recipe - keep them from scoring and Tommy Jackson (our reserve keepers who plads our cup matches) deals with the rest in the penalty shootout…😈 The defence was definitely our basis behind the good results. Keep them from scoring press them and try to move quickly in fluid counter-attacks was our style of play and it gave us some results but it was not necessarily of much entertainment for our fans. I just need to say that our primary goal is to survive in National League and with a squad with much talent but not a lot of quality this must be the way it works right now. Then entertainment must come later. One of our most important players in this setup is our DLP Andrés de Gracia who still was improving stats all the time. He is developing into our star player with potential for more. De Gracia is on contract until 2025 but perhaps it may prove difficult to extend the contract period as he is aware that he is a better player than his teammates In March, the club was taken over by a local investor, Rob Richards after a short period (a week or so) with a transfer ban. I was really looking forward to find out which new opportunities this could provide us in order to attract better players. I don’t know - perhaps it’s just me expecting too much - but I wasn’t too impressed about the new investors injection of capital - £1,500 won’t change that much for us….😡 I would have appreciated if we could have enough funding for an improved youth setup. At least I won’t embarrass too many people by stating that the youth player generation of year 2024 at Hungerford Town wasn’t even near being characterised as an improvement for our squad….😩 A lost year I would say Well, back to the League. We were still collecting points from time to time and with five matches left of the season we were sitting comfortably in the middle of the league table in 13th place with six points up to the playoff zone but - more important - 13 points above the relegation zone. Therefore, we could focus on the FA Trophy. After beating Eastleigh 2-1 at home at Winklebury Football Complex in the quarter finals we were facing Chesterfield at home in the semi final. A difficult match against a team sitting above us in the league. Game very close - heading for injury time but in 88th minute midfielder Jake Evans scored our winning goal at long range. 1-0 and we were ready for the FA Trophy final at Wembley Stadium 😀💪. Just after the FA Trophy semi-final we had other good news. The expansion project at Bulpit Lane to a capacity of 4,388 spectators had ended and we could terminate our rental in Basingstoke. Home sweet home ⚽️ We finished our league season with only one point in the final four matches so we dropped two places and ended in 15th place. As this was Hungerford’s first season ever in National League this still was a new club record. In the following three weeks we had no planned matches so we played three friendlies against lower ranking teams to keep the good form and to improve the team’s morale - and with victories of 5-1, 9-0 and 8-0 morale was high before the most important match in the 138 years of club history: the FA Trophy final of 2024 between Hungerford and Chesterfield (who finished second in National League but lost their playoff final at Wembley a week before the final 1-0 to Oldham). Chesterfield had to be favourites before the final. The final developed similarly to our previous cup matches. Gerald Muchechetere (our top goal scorer) made it 1-1 in first half just a minute after a goal to Chesterfield. No more goals were scored despite 120 minutes of play. We had great confidence in our keeper, Tommy Jackson, ut this time he didn’t manage to save their penalties and with a missed penalty from 19-year old winger Reece Niicholas-Davies we lost the final 6-5 after penalties 😩 Despite our great disappointment with the result of the final it gave our finances a great boost. With 19,360 spectators at Wembley Stadium and £30K in prize money improved our bank status from zero to £165,000 - a solid economy as basis for future developments 👍 Now we could go on a well-deserved holiday after a very long season with great hopes for the coming season! Edited May 7, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
dtown1414 Posted March 31, 2023 Share Posted March 31, 2023 Nice to see you have some cash to spend. Good luck next season. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted April 2, 2023 Author Share Posted April 2, 2023 On 31/03/2023 at 22:43, dtown1414 said: Nice to see you have some cash to spend. Good luck next season. Yes at least this removes a potential problem with the financials at the moment. However, I suggested the Board that they should spend some of the money on improvemts regarding our youth setup or our training facilities - but both requests were rejected But to be fair - they had provided me with an 25% increase in my wage budget so perhaps it was fair enough… 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted April 2, 2023 Author Share Posted April 2, 2023 (edited) Pre-season 2024 (National League) After finishing in the middle of National League in our first season my ambitions for the coming season were to get us in the best half (or perhaps in the best third) of National League. The Board had fewer ambitions - they were happy if we could avoid relegation so there were nothing in their level of ambitions for the season I don’t think we can’t match. The Board provided me with an improved wage and transfer budget but it had been expensive to keep hold on the first team squad of last season so I was struggling to find enough money to sign new players to our first team or interesting talents for our reserve team. Therefore, we had to say goodbye to several fringe players on free transfer or on loans. One of the players we said goodbye to was our vice-captain and club record holder Rhys Tyler who went on loan at Gloucester in National League North after 250 league matches (club record). I had extended his contract during last season until June 2026 (probably an error it could seem to be) but at 31, he had been passed by younger players in our right back position and with a £275 p/w conctract he was too expensive to be playing in our reserve team. Gloucester also had a buy option on Rhys Tyler so to be honest I think we will never see Rhys Tyler in Hungerford’s first team lineup again 😥 Now we must rely on two 19- year old teenagers in right back: Owen Cochrane who played 27 league matches last season as our second choice on right back and young Welshman Callum Jones who came to Hungerford last season from Cardiff and went last season on loan at Slough in National League South and after 37 league matches at Slough (4 goals) he seemed ready for National League games. We also strengthened our defence with 20-year old central defender Harvey Beckett from Cambridge (last season on loan at Dover in National League South - 36 league matches) We signed two talented central midfielders in Ma’kel Bogle-Campbell from Fulham and Kieran Morgan from Tottenham. I believe we’re having fine backup players if Andrés de Gracia decided to leave us after the season. I will try to build them up during the season in hope that become contenders for our starting lineup next season. Last season we signed 21-year old Syme Mulvany at Folkestone and let him finish the season at Folkestone on loan. Now he was ready to fight for a spot in our first-team against older players like captain Joel Rollinson (25) and Claudio Ofosu (25) who can feel the breath from several younger players on the back of their necks. The last - but not the least - newcomer was an 18-year old striker from QPR, Youssef Yahyaoui who had spent last season on loan in Nuneaton in National League North. Interesting to see if he could partner up with Gerald Muchechetere in front and become a regular in our starting lineup. In total I believe we have an exciting squad for the season. Many talents but still with experienced players among them. Two good and very talented keepers, reasonably good players in defence, a star duo in midfield (Andrés de Gracia and Jake Evans), great wingers and talented strikers (and still with veteran striker Niko Muir in the squad as backup player. Edited April 2, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted April 6, 2023 Author Share Posted April 6, 2023 Autumn 2024 (National League) We started the league competition away against Chesterfield, last season’s no. 12 in Vanarama National League. As we had finished in 15th place we were underdogs but - despite a missed penalty kick by Jake Evans in first half - we came out of the match with a very comfortable 3-0 victory. Callum Jones in right back and Harvey Beckett in central defence started in as debutants and Ma’kel Bogle-Campbell also made his debut as a substitute in second half. Great start 💪 As mentioned in the latest update, talented midfielder Andrés de Gracia wasn’t too happy about playing for Hungerford in National League and probably wanted to move on and I was expecting him to leave after the season if we didn’t receive an attractive offer for him before that. During our third league match - against Torquay - he had played a miserable first half and I pulled him out in 55th minute as a consequence of his poor match performance. Some days later he asked for a personal meeting with me where he wanted to discuss his future at Hungerford. His ambitions were definitely higher than National League so he wanted to leave to a bigger club as his teammates weren’t good enough I told him that I would look to bring in players to help the team match his ambitions instead of him leaving us now. He wasn’t happy about my reply but at least I was honest to him that I wouldn’t just let him go. So his message to the press was that he may leave us on a Bosman after this season. Not pleasant and it was definitely also very upsetting and concerning that one of our star players wants to leave AND ditches his teammates in the process. I was worried about the possible negative effect on his performance in the coming matches but Andrés de Gracia has a resolute personality which means that his professionalism and determination are very high so my worries turned out to be unnecessary, in the following three matches he performed very well with a goal and a very good effort in a 5-0 win over King’s Lynn as the icing on the cake. A true professional! Actually we had a great start of the season 😀 After nine league matches we were still undefeated - four wins and five draws - and in second place in the League. The atmosphere was great around club both among players and with the fans. One of our new players, right back Callum Jones was developing remarkably and everyone in the club had skipped talking about the absence of former captain Rhys Tyler who had been sent on loan to Gloucester to ease the pressure on our budget. I don’t know whether it was due to our good results, the great atmosphere surrounding the club or the good performances by our new players but I noted that De Gracia’s mood had changed. Now it was no longer an issue that his teammates weren’t good enough or that he wanted to move to a bigger club. Now he was slightly unhappy with his contract (£150 per week) instead. I chose to start negotiations with de Gracia regarding a new and improved contract and I managed to close a deal with de Gracia so that he signed a 3-year prolongation of his contract - with an option for Hungerford to extend the contract with an extra year Now we could focus on making Andrés de Gracia to a club legend at Hungerford instead… My major problem with the new contract was that he will become the highest earning player with a £675 per week contract (8% of our present wage budget) at the end of this season. I was already struggling with the present wage budget (sent Niko Muir on loan to avoid his £120 per week salary plus he was only a fringe player after the signing of Youssef Yahyaoui) With this issue handled we could focus on our successful run in National League. We broke a new club record with sixten matches in a row undefeated (last match in previous season and 15 matches with no defeats in this season) - and a top spot in the league as a result. The best performers in the season so far had been Gerald Muchechetere (age 20) in front (7 goals), Reece Nicholas-Davies (age 20) as left winger, Harvey Beckett (age 21) and Callum Jones (age 19) in defence and Beau Hudd (age 20) in goal. We were definitely heading for a bright future… Simultaneously with the success we were trying to get more success in FA Cup. Our first match was in 4th Qual. Round away against Tonbridge from National League South. It turned out to be more complicated than expected but after a late goal by Baylin Johnston we scrambled a 2-1 victory back to Hungerford. Not impressive but enough. The qualification to First Round Proper in FA Cup pleased the Board but that would probably become the end for us as we were facing Salford from League One in an away match. But Salford probably took it too easy as we were up 2-0 at half-time 💪 but we came under a massive pressure in second half so it ended with a 2-2 draw and a reply match in Hungerford (with £35K in TV money coming to us) 🤑 More about that in our next update…. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted April 8, 2023 Author Share Posted April 8, 2023 Winter 2024/25 (National League) Our fantastic run of 16 undefeated league matches ended in Southend. Our luck simply ran out and Southend deserved their win after a miserable performance by our side Then we could look forward to our replay match against Salford in First Round of FA Cup. If we could win the match it would be first time for Hungerford Town to qualify to FA Cup Second Round. Furthermore, we could expect a record turnout at Bulpit Lane (record turnout at Bulpit Lane until now was 1,684 against Sudbury in 1989 - club record is 3,368 in 2023 when we played in Basingstoke during expansion of Bulpit Lane). Salford plays in League One which is two levels above Vanarama National League. They showed their class in second half of the first match when they turned a 0-2 deficit at half-time to a 2-2 draw and in the replay match they continued to show their high level with a well-deserved 2-0 victory in a match where we never came really close to a result. But the turnout of 2,684 fans at Bulpit Lane was a new stadium record and also a record revenue income from gate receipts for Hungerford 👍 and a record balance in the bank of £236,000. As I was struggling to keep us within the wage budget of £8,500 per week I thought this was the time to ask for an increased wage budget - but no way - Chairman Rob Richards seems to be a new Uncle Scrooge….😱 Btw.: The 2025 intake from our youth team doesn’t seem to include the new Lionel Messi or Cristiano Ronaldo…👎 A new disappointment! After a tight program during the autumn with many league and cup matches we had severe scoring problems. In December we played five matches and only scored once so we lost the top spot in National League and fell to fifth place in the table. I had noticed that we lost possession very much and therefore I tried to tweak the tactics and it helped so after 31 of 46 league matches we were in second position in the table only two points behind the table leaders from Carlisle after five wins in a row. We had introduced two new players in our first team. Max Giani (20, AMRC/ST) had came to Hungerford from Salisbury a year ago on a free transfer. He had spent last season on loan at our affiliate club Potter’s Bar in Isthmian Premier and I wanted to have him at our Reserve Team this season but he had played well and passed Syme Mulvany as my preferred backup as right winger. Max can also play as striker or AMC I had for some time wanted to get 18-year old midfielder Ellis Horan from Boston United to our team on a free transfer but had failed due to my “budget problems” but instead I managed to get him on a season-long loan without any costs from Boston United and followed that up with a conctract at season end when it became possible! Great talent and a possible backup for our DLP Andrés de Gracia. Reece Wylie (22) our previous backup in midfield wasn’t too happy about his playing time and was sent on loan at Billericay after playing 39 league matches for our side during the previous three years. After last season’s FA Trophy final at Wembley we hoped to make it once again. It started out fine with a win over Dover after a penalty shootout (after 0-0 in 90 mins) and an easy 2-0 win at home over Wealdstone but our hopes for a new success in FA Trophy ended with a defeat in yet another penalty shootout - this time against league rivals Eastleigh in Fifth Round Now we could concentrate our efforts on National League! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted April 11, 2023 Author Share Posted April 11, 2023 (edited) Spring 2025 (National League) Harvey Beckett who had joined us in the pre season last year had turned into an extra weapon for our side on corner kicks and free kicks. With his great qualities in air (17 in Jumping Reach) we had found a way to get goals and points even when our play wasn’t working. In our home match against Bromley we were pressed through the whole match but two goals after corners from Harvey Beckett gave us an undeserved 2-0 victory (Bromley got FM’ed ) We were going through a very good period with seven victories in seven matches and thing were definitely going our way at the moment. Notice: six clean sheets in the seven won matches! Gateshead also got FM’ed…. Overall we managed to get 11 wins in 12 matches (and a 0-2 defeat against Halifax) with a total goal score of 21-7. Not a lot of goals but definitely enough With eight matches left of the season we were in leading position, four points ahead of Woking and seven points ahead of Carlisle. Our best league position ever was already a reality and Top-3 seemed certain. But now we are heading for promotion as our only ambition 👀 Bulpit Lane is turning into a new Theatre of Dreams… But we were soon to get back to realism. Our next match was a home match against Southend (4th position). A live TV match and 2,249 fans in Bulpit Lane - perfect for a real show-off from our side. And so it began. Two goals by Gerald Muchechetere and a great long range goal from Jake Evans gave us a 3-0 lead after 27 minutes. I praised my players a lot at half-time but in the other dressing room Southend manager Luke Garrard performed small miracles. They came out to second half with great motivation and quality and 20 minutes later we were down 3-4 😡 and eventually lost. Man I was angry with my players… But the catastrophic 20 minutes against Southend turned out to become a minor thing in our run for promotion. We won the following match 2-1 in Hartlepool and maintained a steady lead in front of the National League with a five point lead to Woking. The table standings was so great for us that I didn’t even got annoyed when our HOYD presented this year’s intake of youth players…. The following match could be very decisive for our season - against no. 2 Woking. A win would give us an eight point lead but a defeat would open the race for the league title. Thankfully, our young striker Youssef Yahyaoui (19) gave us the lead in the middle of first half and in the rest of the match we managed to keep Woking away from scoring - with this win we were heading for League Two 💪 After the Woking match we lost 0-2 to Colchester and played a goalless draw in Yeovil so with three matches left the lead to Woking had been reduced to three points (and with Woking having the better goal score). Now it was only a fight between us and Woking as Carlisle no longer could pass us in the table. We needed seven points in the final three matches to be sure to keep Woking behind us. The first of the three final matches was our last home match - against Boreham Woods (placed in 11th position). We definitely didn’t play good but our “secret weapon” (a header from Harvey Beckett - his 10th league goal of the season) was enough for us and as Woking played 1-1 in Scunthorpe we were five points ahead with only two matches left. The following match was to be played at Beveree Stadium in Hampton. Hampton & Richmond had already been relegated to Vanarama South and their fans showed their dissatisfaction by staying at home so in front of only 398 spectators we outplayed Hampton & Richmond 4-1. Hungerford Town had won the National League and are promoted to League Two 😀😀😀 In the end we finished with a four point lead to Woking The promotion to League Two had immense consequences for our club. First of all the Board decided to go from semi professional to professional meaning new contracts for all of us and a wage budget which had grown from £8,500 per week to almost £21,000 per week. However this was nothing compared to the Board’s decision to build an entirely new stadium - Hungerford Stadium with a 5,000 capacity ! An investment of £6.1 million and a loan of £3.7 million after a grant from the authorities and a sale of Bulpit Lane. A bit emotionel as Bulpit Lane has been the home ground for Hungerford Town FC since just after World War I - for more than 100 years! If this went wrong Hungerford Town FC could end in bankruptcy. I took the responsibility upon myself by extending my contract. We’re in this together, Hungerford 👀 Our squad for the season: Thanks for following 😀 Edited April 11, 2023 by OleDK 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted April 16, 2023 Author Share Posted April 16, 2023 (edited) Pre-season 2025 (League Two) In March 2024, a local investor named Rob Richards took over the ownership of Hungerford Town FC. I had never been impressed by his actions. His injection in our funds in March 2024 was only £1,500 (lol) and with his stadium plans our bank loans exceeds £4 million. Therefore, I welcome the news about Rob Richards’ plans to sell the club and wind down his career in football. The takeover process was completed a month later. New owner is another local investor Peter Murphy (44) and with an initial injection of £150K in the club’s coffers I feel that we’re going to become good friends…😈 The Board’s expectations were not affected by the takeover. The ambition is to avoid relegation and to be competitive in the cup tournaments (FA Cup, Carabao Cup and Papa Johns Trophy) Our funds were also strengthened a bit by a record sale of our former top goal scorer Niko Muir to Dover for £10,500 (former record sale was £4,000) regarding a transfer to Barnstaple).. Now back to the football. We were one of the smallest towns ever to play in the English Football League ((Hungerford is about the same size as Nailsworth where Forest Green Rovers is based) and with this becoming our first season as professional and our first season in EFL nobody believes we will be able to survive😥 So this could definitely turn out to be the most difficult season until now for me and my players. We managed to sign some talented players to strengthen our side: * John Obinna, 18 years, DC/DMC/MC, from Ipswich * Izac Khan, 19 years, DR/DMC/MC, from AFC Telford * Sumaila Owusu, 18 years, MC/AMRC, from Tottenham (Ghanaian) * Nathan Browne, 18 years, MC/AMRC, from Bradford PA (51 league matches) (Northern Irish) * Danny Gough, 18 years, :ML/AMLC, from Stoke * Anthony Donovan, 18 years, SC, from Newcastle (Welsh) Also Alfie Matthews, 23 years, AMRLC/ST (4 league matches for Hungerford in 2023/24) returned to Bulpit Lane afte a successful loan at Maidstone last season and was once again battling for a place in our starting lineup. With the latest additions to our squad we had too many wingers in our squad. Claudio Ofosu (26) went to Salisbury on a season loan. Captain Joel Rollinson (26) could become a suplus to our requirements this season so in respect for him I offered him for sale). He found out so now he’s not talking to me….😱 I hope he’ll be good again so he can stay as backup or leave us on a loan Here are our new players: And our first team squad before our debut in League Two: Edited April 16, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted April 26, 2023 Author Share Posted April 26, 2023 (edited) Autumn 2025 (League Two) Our first match ever in EFL was set to be a home match against Northampton. In front of 2,235 fans at Bulpit Lane we had a great start with debutant Irish striker Anthony Donovan giving us an early lead after only 11 minutes . After 90 minutes the standing was a 1-1 draw but altogether I was very happy with our start of the season. Only four days later we should have our debut in another tournament the Carabao Cup away against Swansea from Championship. We were given no chances at all but we followed up with our well-known recipe from our recent successes in cup tournaments: focus on the defence and let our Cup goalkeeeper Tommy Jackson (21) take care of the rest…. So yet another goalless draw and a 4-3 win after penalties - a sensational victory Last penalty goal executed by our determined captain Renedi Masmampu (age 25) Sadly Masampu was injured with sports hernia a few weeks later. He had become a key player for our squad with his great personality and leadership. We couldn’t follow up on the sensationel win in Swansea. In second Round of Carabao Cup we were thrashed 4-1 by league rivals Crawley… We are also done in the “small” tournament Papa Johns Trophy after losing 1-3 to Fulham reserve team and 1-2 to Forest Green Rovers. Not a priority with PJT for us in that tournament but a bit disappointing altogether anyways. After the promotion we had turned full-time professional. After a few months more or less the whole first-team squad had signed professional contracts with our profiles Andrea de Gracia and Callum Jones as some of the last first team players. We still had some reserve players on part time contracts but I was seroiusly under pressure with my wage budget so some players were denied a new contract. We strengthened our defence by signing 20-year old Noah McCann (DLC) from QPR - last season on loan at Chesham/18 matches in VNS. I see him as a central defender but is a natural left back. I also decided to strengthen our staff. I had been unhappy with the players from our Youth department for some years and I hoped that 34-year old Mark Scott could improve the quality coming from our own ranks. Josh, you’re fired😈! At the same time I felt we could do better in DoF so I hired 59-year old Cristian Jarvis as our new DoF with better quality and a better personality. It did take some of our money to make the two changes in staff but I felt it was necessary for us in order to stay on track with our positive development. A curious thing from our League Match against Port Vale - Port Vale received a red card after only 15 seconds! This helped us take an fine 2-0 win in the match… After 15 league matches we were sitting comfortably in 13th position. Just five points behind the playoff zone but more importantly nine points above relegation zone! Our 18-year old striker Anthony Donovan as top goal scorer (7 goals) Edited April 26, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted April 30, 2023 Author Share Posted April 30, 2023 (edited) Winter 2025/26 (League Two) Our participation in FA Cup ended as soon as it begun. We had drawn Hartlepool from VNL away in First Round and went to Hartlepool as favourites. After a terrible performance by our side Hartlepool could celebrate a well-deserved 1-0 victory 😡 We had a small success by winning our last match in Papa Johns Trophy, 1-0 away over Cambridge from League One. We ended third in our group - an acceptable result in this peculiar tournament. £10K in price money for beating Cambridge. After ending our cup run with little success we could concentrate on our survival efforts in League Two. The attendance record at Bulpit Lane was broken when losing 0-1 to our local rivals from Swindon (we used to be an afilliate club to Swindon) - 3,560 in old Bulpit Lane which probably wouldn’t be broken as we were moving to our new stadium after the season Some of our young players were developing rapidly. Midfielder Nathan Browne (18) and striker Anthony Donovan (18) were developing into key players despite their young age The continued scouting for new players is necessary for us as there still are no good news from our Youth Department…Perhaps a striker for our reserve squad if lucky. At New Year we were placed comfortably in 11th place with seven points down to AFC Winbledon in the relegation zone. We didn’t score many goals but were difficult to defeat. A little bit as our debut season in VNL two years ago. Our only goal is survival - not entertainment! Two of our biggest profiles, keepe Beau Hudd and right back Callum Jones were injured in January. Instead I promoted two big talents from our reserve team, 18-year old Welsh/Italien keeper Nicola Castelli (free transfer from Bournemouth in June 2025) and 18-year old right back/defensive midfielder Barry Rose (free transfer from Crystal Palace in July 2025). Both had developed very well in our reserve team and seemed ready for first team action The January transfer window provided us with a single addition to our first team squad. 18-year old right winger David Parker who had played 68 League matches for Carshalton in Isthmian Premier for the last 2.5 season (a former Boston U youth player) and was ready to be tried on a higher level. A fast player with nice dribbling and crossing skills. In December/January we had an unbeaten run of eight matches which is great but when you look at the figures, two wins and six draws and among these five 0-0 draws I could understand that our fans didn’t feel much entertainment but I felt it was necessary for us to survive in a close League standing. After 31 matches we were still placed in the middle of the League (13th) and with the best defence in the League. Almost half of our matches had been draws. Despite the few goals scored by our team Anthony Donovan was in top of the goalscorer list together with Freddie Draper from Shrewsbury. Our financial situation was not good. Our savings had been spent primarily because we were paying on our loans regarding our new stadium (£300K year to date) but they were still building it…. Thanks for reading Edited May 14, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted May 4, 2023 Author Share Posted May 4, 2023 (edited) Spring 2026 (National League) The following seven matches provided us nine points (two 1-0 wins three draws and two defeats) and we now had a secure distance to the relegation spots (7 points down with 8 rounds left) and we could breathe a little easier so I began changing our tactics a little bit in order to make our offensive better - to score more goals after scoring only 34 goals in 38 matches. And it seemed to help 😀💪 At a moment we were very close to the playoff spots but after the final match in the season we were sitting in 11th place. A great result for small Hungerford Town to finish in the top half of League Two when everybody believed we would end with a relegation to VNL. And we scored 12 goals in our final 8 matches 19-year old Anthony Donovan had been a major contributor in our offensive actions and finished a League top goal scorer Our youth Department delivered the promised striker. As expected not first team material at the moment but I was hoping he could develop into a backup striker in future if he could develop well Our team cohesion was also improving: Anthony Donovan and Nathan Browne were unhappy about their contracts and after negotiations they ended with £525 per week contracts (triple of previous wages) but with an extension to 2028 + option for an extra year if the club wishes to extend the contract. All in all okay. The most expensive contract is Andrés de Gracia with £625 per week. Not large figures considered they are playing as full time professionals. All players in first team squad are on contract in 2026/27 👍 Our financial status is okay after receiving £483K in solidarity payment for participating in League Two so our bank account balance is in plus again We were expected to move into our brand new stadium Hungerford Stadium in the end of June but very disappointing the project was 5 (five) months delayed so instead of moving into a brand new stadium we were required to rent another stadium for the first half of next season 😡😡😡 The Board’s ambition for next season is still to stay in League Two so not necessary to be doubting in my chances to stay in charge of Hungerford. Howvever they now think we should be very good at set pieces 🤨 Edited May 7, 2023 by OleDK 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted May 4, 2023 Author Share Posted May 4, 2023 (edited) Hungerford Town FC In real life this season was a disappointment for Hungerford Town FC. Hungerford finished in the bottom of Vanarama National League South and is relegated to Tier 7 in the English Football Pyramid next season. The final standings: Sad news I hope that if any fans of Crusaders are following my career this may provide you with some consolation🥲 I’m hoping for a quick return to VNS for Crusaders 💪 Edited May 6, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted May 6, 2023 Author Share Posted May 6, 2023 (edited) Pre-season 2026 (League Two) My transfer strategy is to sign young transfer free players (or at very low transfer fees at maximum £2,500) aged 21 or younger. Players rated 1.5 stars or less is to be sent on loan and also players rated with 2 stars if we have enough players to fill our reserve team at any time. This strategy is paying off well as the players we send on loan often come back a lot better than when they left us. This strategy meant that we could strengthen our first team squad with the following players: Zak Collingwood, 18 years, DRC, free transfer from Arsenal Ibrahim Bah, Sierra Leone, 19 years, DC, free transfer from Hull a year ago - spent last season on loan at Nuneaton Borough in VNN Richard Monk, 18 years, DLC, free transfer from Bournemouth Chris Wray, 18 years, DL/WBL, free transfer from Bamber Bridge in January (1 first team match last season - now ready for first team) Brad Gordon, 18 years, M/AM (RC) / ST, free transfer from Guiseley last year - spent last season on loan at Gloucester in VNN Michael McCarthy, Irish, 19 years, DMC/MC/AMC, free transfer from Preston last year - spent last season on loan at Braintree in VNN Luke Cooper, 19 years, AMRL/ST, free transfer from Brentford I was extremely happy about our new players. Especially in defence we looked a lot stronger than last year but Brad Gordon and Luke Cooper were also battling for first team action in the offensive positions from Day 1 in pre-season. The tough competition among the players meant that others must leave. Our former captain Joel Rollinson (27 years) left us on a free transfer ro Ebbsfleet in VNL after 132 first team appearances for Hungerford but only one appearance last season. Central defender Matt Berry-Hargreaves (27 years) left us on loan to Torquay in VNL after being loan listed as I could see that he was not going to play for us this season. Matt was one of the few players to have stayed in Hungerford longer than I (7 seasons) but with his contract running out after this season it has probably come to an end. Furthermore, Alfie Matthews (24) (AMRLC/ST) went on loan to Maidstone in VNS. I decided that Charlie Noakes (23) and Harvey Beckett (22) would stay as backup among the reserves as long as I could keep them happy in that role (probably not all season) I believe we can achieve more this season than last season and hopefully reach the playoffs. I have not shared my ambition with the Board in case my plan fail. The Board is happy just if we can survive and definitely the bookmakers do not expect us to survive Once again there were rumours concerning a potential takeover (which would be my third takeover during a bit more than 4 seasons) but our chairman is denying everything ….. 🤨 We had a great pre-season with no defeats - come on League Two we are ready! Edited May 9, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted May 9, 2023 Author Share Posted May 9, 2023 (edited) Autumn 2026 (League Two) Our beginning of the 2026/27 season was great. We did not lose any of our six initial matches (4 wins and 2 draws) - always good to ease any pressure coming from the Board Btw we played our home matches at home at Bulpit Lane despite the message from League Two management declaring we couldn’t - perhaps we received a dispensation ?🧐 Our presence in Carabao Cup was very brief. We had drawn Sheffield United from Championship at home and we did our best but lost 1-0 after a good fight. But with a new stadium record with 4,327 fans in stadium and £75K in gate receipts 💷💷💷 Ibrahim Bah (now with 4 caps for the Sierra Leonean national team) was getting in as first team regular when not playing for his national team and versatile Brad Gordon also has managed to play a lot. Two new players that were expected to be reserve team players broke into first team: Harvey Cribb, 20 years, MC/AMC, free transfer from Scunthorpe in June (last season on loan at Scarborough in VNN) and Marley St. Louis, 20 years, ST, free transfer from Leyton Orient in June (4 matches in League Two for Leyton Orient) On Deadline Day we suddenly received an unexpected £140K transfer bid for 19-year old Pat Mason who is one of our keepers in our reserve team (not even close to first team yet) from Blackpool. I had signed Pat Mason on a free transfer in December 2025 (ex-Liverpool youth player) and had him on loan at Welling in VNS the following 6 months and had him in our reserve team hoping that he could get his breakthrough but this was too good to be neglected. I negotiated the offer and ended with a £210K deal and a 45% clause regarding future transfer profits. Great for our economy but despite a promise from the Board I received zero for my transfer budget….😡 the sales price was 20 times higher than the previous club record Back to the football… in Papa Johns Trophy we have so far played two matches. A 0-2 home defeat to Brighton Reserves (almost with an empty Bulpit Lane stadium) and (like last year) managed to beat Cambridge after a penalty shootout (decisive penalty by Andrés de Gracia) Before that super-sub Youssef Yahyaoui had scored the equalizer to 1-1 in 93rd minute… In the League we had struggled a bit after the great beginning of the season. After 14 points in the first six matches we only managed to get 11 points in the following nine matches (2 wins 5 draws and 2 defeats) and dropping to 6th place but still a very satisfactory position 💪 Edited May 14, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted May 13, 2023 Author Share Posted May 13, 2023 (edited) Winter 2026/27 (League Two) Swindon Town was formerly one of our affiliate clubs and is - together with Reading FC - the closest we come to “local rivals”. We are situated just a half hour drive away from Swindon and therefore the draw of Swindon Town from League One as our opponents in FA Cup First Round provided our fans with a great opportunity to follow us in an away match at The County Ground in Swindon. In front of 6,713 viewers we gave it a good effort but in the end Swindon could celebrate a well-deserved 2-1 victory. A few days later it was our turn to celebrate a cup victory - a 2-1 away victory over League Two rivals Newport County after two goals from young Brad Gordon secured a qualification to Second Round in Papa Johns Trophy - best result ever for us as we were eliminated in the Group Stage last year. And then at last - after a five month delay we could play at our brand new Hungerford Stadium with a total capacity of 5,000 seats in a home match against Colchester (1-0 victory in front of 3,152 happy fans) We would have enjoyed to play our Second Round match in Papa Johns Trophy at home at brand new Hungerford Stadium but okay - Tottenham Hotspur Stadium isn’t bad at all as we had drawn Tottenham Reserves in Second Round. In front of 5,434 at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium we lost 1-2 and with that result our cup run in 2026/27 was over. Once again our youth department could not provide any squad improvements…. We had a great December with four wins in five matches and we could regain the top spot in the League before New Year. The Board were eccstatic and offered a 3% (😱) increase in the wage budget if the survival ambition was to be replaced with an ambition of a mid-table finish. Not a penny more was to be offered if I said we could win League Two so I was ok with the new season expectation regarding a mid-table finish. i could do with the money as I was £1,500 p/w over the previous wage limit. Young Harvey Cribb (turned into a first team regular) won the League Two Player of the Month price (and also Young Player of the Month) for December and I won the League Two Manager of the Month title 💪 So… we’re seated in the top spot of League Two, the Board is eccstatic and so are the fans… what’s not to like about that ? No problems surrounding us…. But then the transfer window opened…and this happened that made me use a lot of time to think things through 🤨 Brad Gordon has developed rapidly and has become a profile and a first team regular as striker or right winger (and rotation player in central midfield). £205,000 is a lot of money for a small club like Hungerford but after the record sale of Pat Mason four months ago we are in a reasonably good financial situation and besides, £205K is less than the valuation of £240K regarding the estimated transfer value of Brad Gordon So I decided to turn down the £205,000 offer from Huddersfield hoping that Brad Gordon would understand my position - which he seemed to do. But four days later Huddersfield gave us a new offer - this time increased to £275,000. Once more I rejected the Huddersfield offer without negotiating it. Than..,four days later Huddersfield came with their third offer - £400,000 - the double compared to their first offer. This time I went into negotiations with Huddersfield and after some bargaining Huddersfield ended the discussion with their final non-negotiable offer: £510,000 in transfer fee (£275,000 now and 235,000 in three instalments of £78,000 in January 2028, January 2029 and January 2030) and a sell-on clause of 40% of profit from future transfers plus Hungerford having him on loan until June 2027 at no cost. That was simply too much money to turn down so I accepted. I hope I won’t regret this too much…😩 Btw I didn’t get a penny to my transfer budget despite the Board promising me £300K. All the money went straight into the bank account….😡 I guess the Board was busy regarding a potential takeover (again) but still a promise is a promise in my world! Thankfully, the performance and results on grass were not affected by the sale of Brad Gordon and the takeover rumours. 11 matches undefeated 👍 not a lot of entertainment which the Board complains about but I’m hired to make results as first priority and to entertain as second priority! We had strengthened our first team squad with two additions in the winter transfer window: Steven Collett, 19 years, DLC/AML, free transfer from Bromley (ex-Arsenal youth player) - 10 matches in VNL this season and Lennon Dobson, 21 years, DMC/MC/AMC, player exchange (with one of our reserve team players) from Morecambe Steven Collett was even more competition to our captain Renedi Masampu (27 years) and young Chris Wray (see below regarding the training performance and development of Chris Wray - very impressive!) on left back but with his ability to play as left winger and central defender I believe he will have a lot of matches for our side. Perhaps Masampu could be in his final season with us ? Lennon Dobson was signed to provide us with better depth in our defensive midfield position. It is always a good thing to remember your background. Our background at Hungerford Town FC is that we are a small and (until recently) quite poor football club from a small town in Berkshire. There are probably more than 100 football clubs in England alone that has more power and more money than us. If I had forgotten that I definitely became aware of it on Deadline Day. Luton met the release clause of £145,000 regarding our regular right winger Nathan Browne and there is nothing in the whole world I can do about it now 😡 Thankfully, Luton offered a loan with no costs for the remainder of the season which I said “Yes, please” to so I could maintain my squad for the rest of the season. At least our financial situation is great now 🤑 with £350,000 in the bank and £300,000 in future instalments from this season’s transfers. In total the winter transfer window of 2027 had been a lot of ups and downs but after its closing we have a strengthened squad for the remainder of the season and we were leading the League Two - however a close race with only seven points between us as leaders and Cheltenham in 8th position below the playoff spots so nothing was sure yet… But we are positive and full of self confidence 👍 Edited May 14, 2023 by OleDK 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted May 17, 2023 Author Share Posted May 17, 2023 (edited) Spring 2027 (League Two) Rumours regarding a potential takeover are coming and going but our chairman is still in denial… 🤨 We were having more injuries and other stuff (among other a virus flu that sent three first team regulars home ) and the results were affected plus we were a bit unlucky. The 2-1 defeat against Exeter was quite crucial for us as it was a top clash with Exeter in second place and us in the lead (until we switched places following our defeat). The defeat to Morecambe was purely bad luck! I had to agree with the Board that we did not score a lot. Our good position was purely based on a solid defence so once again I tried to tweak the tactics with a “shoot more often” instruction to our poacher (Donovan) and a more supporting role to our DLP (De Gracia) and at least the first tweak regarding our poacher gave us some more shots on goal - and some more goals 👍 We were also lucky (contrary to the Morecambe defeat - a 2-1 win over Bradford after 94th minute goal by Muchechetere as super sub - not unlucky! Another player from our reserve squad was pushing on for first team matches. 19-year old Ryan Hewitt - a free transfer from Aldershot in June 2026 - was showing good development in our reserve team and with injury periods and national team matches to our first team right backs (Callum Jones and Barry Rose - the latter being national player for Barbados). A good prospect for the future Exeter has the top spot now and is heading for the League Two title but we were still a part of the promotion race in a still quite close table. However, we will be very disappointed if we fail to qualify for the playoffs. We will definitely finish better than last season (11th place). But luck had changed for Exeter who suffered three defeats in a row. With our third victory in row in the same period and a nice and very welcome hat-trick by Anthony Donovan we passed Exeter in the top and we were suddenly pushing for the league title and heading for League One 💪😀 With four League matches left we were 8 points ahead of Crewe Alexandra in fourth position. Only five more points required to get promoted! But the title race had to be without our regular right back Callum Jones 😡 Happy to have good reserve players on that position. Our next match was of great importance to us - an away match in Crewe who is sitting in fourth position. A defeat would reduce our distance to five points (with three matches remaining). A draw would be a fine result for us and a win would be fantastic for us. But we were not playing well at all😩 Crewe Alexandra took the lead after 30 minutes and increased the lead to 2-0 seven minutes later and we were really on our heels. Thankfully, Anthony Donovan reduced to 1-2 before half time on a penalty kick but I was very dissatisfied with my players in the break. We brought on Baylin Johnson in 64th minute instead of Reece Nicholas-Davies who didn’t have a good day and this was a game changer 😱 Just two minutes later he scored a very important goal with the equalizer to 2-2 after an assist from Brad Gordon. And the match turned out crazy in the injury time. Crewe was attacking but left back Noah McCann got hold on the ball in a tackle that injured him so much he couldn’t continue but while McCann was on the ground Baylin Johnson brought the ball forward and passed to Brad Gordon - who scores to 3-2 in 95th minute😀😀😀. Baylin Johnson finished the match as left back after McCann’s injury but his 30 minutes had been crucial for our side. It’s crazy how FM can make you feel good… 💪👍😀🤨😥😱😡 And as Fleetwood and Mansfield in 5th and 6th place both only had draws in their matches we were qualified for League One for the first time in the history of Hungerford Town FC 🏴🏴🏴 The board increased our player budget with almost 50% (£11,700 per week extra) so we could hopefully attract better players which would be necessary as two of our profiles were leaving (minimum!) and it had been very difficult for me to keep the budget this season so the increase was very welcome. Plus the new players from Youth Department were just as bad as predicted 😩 I suppose the players had a good evening out after the promotion had been secured. Three days after the memorable match in Crewe we had a home match against Bristol Rovers. Half of my regular lineup wasn’t fit and the rest played like s…! But managed to get a 0-0 draw😉 Exeter and Stockport also only managed to get a draw so the distance to Exeter (3 points) and Stockport (6 points) wasn’t changed. Btw Bristol Rovers was without our former keeper Jed Ward who after three years of patience on the bench now was first team keeper at Bristol Rovers but was injured at the moment (broken leg). The lousy performance against Bristol Rovers continued a week later wit a 2-0 defeat in Accrington but by miracle we maintained our top spot 😀 We just needed one point in the final match at home against mid-table team Shrewsbury - and that is precisely what my players could manage after a long season with many ups and downs (more up than down!) Hungerford Town are the Winners of League Two 2026/27 💪 The celebration of our League Two victory was witnessed by a record attendance at brand new Hungerford Stadium - and also new club record regarding gate receipts 🤑. Not bad with 4,675 at stadium compared to the size of Hungerford (population 5,869)! Our preferred lineup for the season: (note that Gordon and Browne will leave us after the season after the sales to Huddersfield and Luton) So what’s going to happen next season. The Board hopes that we can survive and actually this is also my hope. Nothing higher than that. My players are not of League One standard (and most will say neither of League Two standard) but they also say that bumble bees can’t fly… And finally the Board has taken action upon the poor outcome of our youth academy for several years. A small step but it is in the right direction! See you in League One - Thanks for reading my story 😀 Edited May 17, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted May 24, 2023 Author Share Posted May 24, 2023 (edited) Pre-season 2027 (League One) We were preparing for our first season ever in League One after three promotions in five seasons. For the first time we had to start our season without two players from our preferred lineup as Brad Gordon (19) and Nathan Browne (20) left us after the loan spells following their transfers to Huddersfield and Luton in Championship. I believe that Baylin Johnson (22; our new vice captain) and Luke Cooper (20) could do fine as their substitutes. Luke Cooper was appointed to “Signing of the season in League Two and perhaps this could be his chance to shine for us. Furthermore, striker Youssef Yahyaoui (21) was unhappy with his playing time last season and during last season I had to promise him that he could go on loan and when Barrow in VNN offered a loan deal I felt I had to accept it but I would have preferred to have him in club as backup for Anthony Donovan. Gerald Muchechetere (23) who has been a vital player for our side in VNS and VNN was very upset about his playing time and left us after the season so we were somewhat weakened in depth among our attackers. Several former first team players left us after their contracts had expired and with no relevance for first team anymore: Jake Evans (29), Matt Berry-Hargreaves (28), Charlie Noakes (24), Dylan Gavin (24), Harvey Beckett (23) and Tommy Jackson (23). Some of them had been out on loan last season but now their time at Hungerford was over. Just like in the last transfer window we received an offer that was to good to turn down immediately. David Parker had been a backup player for our side in the previous two seasons (19 League matches) but had drifted further away from first team squad so he was “expendable” for our side. So a £300K transfer bid from Huddersfield was definitely interesting for us. After negotiations sales price ended at £450K (£240K now and 3 x £70K in 3 instalments in June 2028 June 2029 and June 2030) plus a 45% sell-on clause. Reading tried to sign him with a £525K bid with no clauses but in the end David Parker decided to sign with Huddersfield and once more the transfer amount promised (£250K) by the Board never showed up in my transfer budget….😡 The Board had negotiated with Blackpool regarding the sell-on clause regarding Pat Mason. I decided to cash in and get £49K into the bank instead of the sell-on clause so the club’s financial situation was quite good now We added some interesting prospects for our first team squad on free transfers and players returning after successful loan spells Danny Cullum (German), GK, 21 years, signed three years ago (!) from Ipswich. After a succesful loan spell at SV Wehen Wiesbaden in the German 3 Liga he has passed Beau Hudd as my preferred backup keeper (with Nicola Castelli as a very solid first team keeper) Martin Kucera (Czech U21 national player), DRL, 20 years, free transfer from Hull Henry Fieldson, DC, 22 years, free transfer from Sunderland Stephen O’Connor (Irish), DC/DMC, 20 years, free transfer from BournemouthMichael Robertson (Scottish), DRC/DMC, 18 years, free transfer from SouthamptonDanny Alexander, MC/AMC, 20 years, free transfer two years ago from Woking, returned after a loan spell at Scunthorpe in VNN Paul Hill, 18 years, DMC/MLC, free transfer from Leicester Kevin Evans (Welsh), DL/WBL/ML/AML, 18 years, free transfer from Newcastle Steve Lamb, WBR/MR/AMR, 20 years, free transfer from SunderlandMatthew Dawes, ML/AMRL/ST, 20 years, free transfer two years ago from Gloucester (returned after loan spell at Wealdstone in VNS) It’s good to see that succesful loan spells can make so much development. Three players coming back after loan spells and now included in first team. I believe that Kevin Evans and Matthew Dawes will benefit on the transfers out of Brad Gordon and Nathan Browne and that Stephen O’Connor and Michael Robertson could become good rotation players in defence. But the most exciting new player is probably Paul Hill in midfield. He could perhaps develop into becoming a regular starter instead of Andrés de Gracia who with his 24 years now is the oldest player in our first team squad (as the only one older than 22 years). Danny Alexander could perhaps be the future replacement of Harvey Cribb in midfield. So the first team squad still has a lot of potential and is better than last year’s squad in League Two. We’re ready to battle for survival in League One (a battle which the bookmakers believe we won’t be able to win…) The draw for Papa Johns Trophy - not impossible to proceed to next stage💪 Edited May 24, 2023 by OleDK 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
KlaaZ Posted May 25, 2023 Share Posted May 25, 2023 Very impressive to see how you can stay healthy financially in the lower leagues, keep it up! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted May 28, 2023 Author Share Posted May 28, 2023 On 25/05/2023 at 11:54, KlaaZ said: Very impressive to see how you can stay healthy financially in the lower leagues, keep it up! It is also a very difficult task to keep us healthy financially. I try to keep our salaries at a minimum but still I (in October 2027) am spending 99% of my wage budget. My transfer strategy is to find transfer free players (maximum price £4K) and if they won’t play for £400 or less per week its better they find another club to play at. This more or less makes it impossible to hire experienced players but it groes fine anyway Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted June 1, 2023 Author Share Posted June 1, 2023 (edited) Autumn 2027 (League One) We had our debut in League One at home at Hungerford Stadium against Rotherham in front of a crowd of 4,734 (record high after a record sale of 1,050 season tickets). To be objective, our chances for survival in League One were minimal. Our best rated player (goalkeeper Nicola Castelli) is rated as a “Leading Vanarama National League player” and now we were playing two levels above National League. But at the same time it could lead our opponents to underrate us and I believe that’s what happened for us in our league debut 😀 Harvey Cribb gave us an early lead by his 1-0 goal after only seven minutes followed by a header to 2-0 by central defender Ibrahim Bah until debutant striker Matthew Dawes scored to 3-0 in second half. A sensationel win! Debutants: Matthew Dawes, Paul Hill, Kevin Evans, Stephen O’Connor, Martin Kucera The successful premiere made more people come to Hungerford Stadium. The following four home matches were sold out: - 5,000 tickets sold to all matches! Our first match in Carabao Cup against Notts County (League Two) went well too 😀 But then problems came: injuries to captain Baylin Johnson, experienced midfielder Andrés de Gracia and young Matthew Dawes in combination with international duties and a tight match schedule made the following month more difficult but we did collect some points despite getting some losses too. We had drawn Bournemouth from Premier League (no. 11 last season) at home in the next round of Carabao Cup. We were happy to be hosts but it is a shame that our capacity only is 5,000 seats. We could have sold a lot more tickets if possible The match was not exciting. As expected Bournemouth was the best team and left Hungerford with a 3-1 victory and a place in Third Round As our season progresses it turned out that some of our players did not have the necessary quality for League One. Henry Fieldson (22) was a disappointment in central defence and was demoted to the reserves and Luke Cooper (20) had some disappointing games as winger so he also needed some more training with the reserves 😈 On Deadline Day I decided to sign Portuguese Rafael Monteiro on a free transfer from Nazareno in Portugal. Actually I had him on a non-contract for a few months in 2024 (free transfer from Barnsley) but I could not hold on to him then when Nazareno from his home country approached him with a contract offer. But now he was on a two-year contract here 👍 and was intended to be rotation player in right wing and central midfield positions. I also promoted Tom Baker (GK, 20 years, free transfer from Bournemouth in July) to first team squad as backup for Nicola Castelli and as Cup goalkeeper. I believe he can develop into a decent backup if we suddenly lose Castelli in a transfer bid. We were also looking forward to playing against local rivals Swindon (a 30 minute drive from Hungerford) in League One. However our first battle in Swindon was a great disappointment. To be honest we were almost not present 😡 in 88 of 90 minutes…. Young Tom Baker saved us for a humiliation! We had experienced an old problem again - we couldn’t score goals! But our defence was extremely solid - with Nicola Castelli showing his class in goal so we could get some points but after seven matches in a row without a win we were silentium dropping down in the table just two points ahead of the relegation zone😱 This could develop into a problem for us… Two 1-0 wins - among them a very undeserved win over Bolton gave us some space to relegation zone and we could breathe a sigh of relief. All in all an okay start for us! Left back Chris Wray was still developing fine and was always putting a big effort in training 👍 Edited June 1, 2023 by OleDK 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted June 6, 2023 Author Share Posted June 6, 2023 (edited) Winter 2027/28 (League One) We had drawn Wrexham from League Two in a difficult away match in FA Cup First Round and it was indeed going to be difficult. We were heading for a defeat but Anthony Donovan became our saviour with his equalizer to 1-1 in 94th minute 😀 We had more hope for a win in the replay match at home at Hungerford Stadium in a televised match. To be honest it would have been better for us to play the match in an empty stadium without TV viewers, crowd, press, etc. as our performance was indeed very forgettable 😩 Only a good performance from Ted Baker in our goal made the game end in a penalty shootout after 0-0 in regular time but justice was done properly with a 4-3 win to Wrexham in the penalty shootout 👎 We had some hopes of reaching second round in Papa Johns Trophy after a 3-1 victory against Shrewsbury but after losing 0-2 to Brighton Reserves we needed a win away agains league rivals Wycombe Wanderers and it did not seem to happen as it was still 0-0 after 90 mins but we again were saved by a 94th minute goal this time by substitute striker Marley St. Louis 😉 We didn’t deserve the victory but at the end only goals count in this sport….😈 Our Second Round match in Papa Johns Trophy was at The Valley in Charlton (also league rivals) and we got very close to “Steal of the Century” as were were ahead 1-0 until 81th minute being down 10 vs 11 after a stupid red card to Reece Nicholas-Davies in first half and only one shot on goal in 80 minutes but as in the FA Cup match against Wrexham justice came in the end as Charlton scored twice and secured a 2-1 victory after 26 shots on goal vs 2 shots from our side…. This time we did feel the pain when the opposite team scores in 94th minute 😳 That was it for the Cup tournaments this year so back to League One. Our major problem in this season had been he goalscoring (mainly due to our cautious tactic but it shouldn’t be this difficult). We were lucky to have a class keeper in goal in Italian/Welsh Nicola Castelli who had saved us for a lot. Therefore, I was very happy for him when he could celebrate his first international game for Wales Under-21s (and a clean sheet of course ) But Castelli couldn’t keep saving us from defeats - especially if someone found out about his Release Clause of £165K - oh no now The Athletic spread the news 😱 So I had to tweak our tactics again. I changed the role of Harvey Cribb in midfield from CM-S to CM-A and a few other tweaks to increase our presence close to our opponent’s goal. And it seemed to work. We did become more “leaky” but in the majority of the matches it was very helpful to us and in thirteen matches from end of November to end of January we scored in twelve of them but losing 0-3 to Birmingham and 2-4 to MK Dons were hard to forget… Still when we got ahead our primary focus was to stay in lead instead of going forward for extra goals. Most of our home matches was played in front of a sold out Hungerford Stadium and our finances were developing nicely. The Board made an agreement with Huddersfield to buy them out of the outstanding clause from the sale of David Parker and I decided to cash in - further £79,560 for our bank account making the Parker deal worth £525,000 in total. Our bank account is overflowing and passed £1,000,000 and the Board decided to offer me a new contract and increase the wage budget just a little… (based on our fine performance). The improved financial situation gave some opportunities so when we received offers for Matthew Dawes (almost regular starter as one of our offensive players) and Zak Collingwood (regular starter in central defence and capped for New Zealand) without being great than we were now in a position to decline the offers. I decided to call Youssef Yahyaoui back from his loan spell at Barrow in the January transfer window. He had only played nine matches and all with him starting on the bench so it was better for us to have him as backup for Anthony Donovan here. He didn’t protest even though his loan spell was upon his own request. “Come back Youssef. The grass is not always greener on the other side of the fence.” 😀 I also promoted 21-year old Billy Gough (DL/AML) to our first team squad after developing fine in the reserve team. Gough had joined us in June in a free transfer from Derby. And the standings: the good results had made it possible for us to climb up to 7th place. Relegation is no longer an issue at all. I dare not hope to maintain a playoff spot at Season End as we are the worst team in the xG table. So a good position in the best half after 46 matches would be just fine 😉💪….or….? Thanks for reading 😀 Edited June 6, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted June 14, 2023 Author Share Posted June 14, 2023 (edited) Spring 2028 (League One) When I started at Hungerford Town almost six years ago we were an afilliate club for Reading and Swindon. The partnership ended a few years later but Reading and Swindon are the closest we come to “local rivals”. We had played against Swindon a few times but always came out as losers. Therefore, it was a symbol for our progress to send them back to Swindon with a 3-0 defeat after a very efficient performance by our team. We were no longer the minnows from Hungerford 💪 Except for the fine and self-esteem building win over Swindon we were struggling in the early spring. From end of February to end of March we only added five points to the table in seven matches (five draws and two defeats) but were lucky despite that to maintain a spot in the playoff zone with four matches left of the season. We were out of the race for direct promotion but a place in top 10 was very probable. We were fighting for every inch of the field and sometimes a bit over the line. We broke a record in League One but probably not a record to be proud of 😈: This year’s outcome from Youth Department was not the worst in my time but not future improvements for first team. Perhaps one of the candidates could end up as a trusted reserve team player in Dennis O’Connell - good mental stats. We finally got a win 2-1 at home over Wycombe from the bottom of League One after a 90th minute goal 😳by left-back Chris Wray and the lucky win made us maintain our spot in the playoff zone. We were also a bit lucky in our next match away in Salford. We were about to lose but Matthew Dawes scored the equalizer to 2-2 in 89th minute 😀 With two matches remaining we were in fifth position with one point down to seventh position but with a match against table leaders Blackpool ahead of us. Blackpool had been quite dominant and had already gained promotion to Championship but once again we were “lucky” that Blackpool got a red card in first half. We probably should have won being 11 against 10 but the Blackpool team was so much better than us so we in the end we were happy to get a point after a goalless draw! Now it was all in our hands to qualify for the play-offs being two points ahead of Rotherham and Salford. A win over Ipswich in 15th position would qualify us for the play-offs - a remarkable performance it would be! But our young team with little experience were too nervous in the important match and we had to swallow the disappointment of losing 0-1 to a team with nothing to play for. but we were definitely in a lucky period. Neither Rotherham or Salford managed to win their games so we were ready for two playoff semifinals against Portsmouth 😀💪. We had a 1-0 win and a 0-1 defeat in our two previous league matches against Portsmouth so I hoped it could become close even though Portsmouth has been having a great season so far and finished third in the table - 17 points ahead of us lying in 6th position. It became very difficult for our side in the semifinal when left winger Kevin Evans received his second yellow card just before half time. So we went very defensive and we almost managed to get a draw result but Portsmouth scored in 90th minute 😡 at least they deserved to win the match at least we broke the gate receipts record with £130K for our finances 💷 Before the away match there was a relaxed mood among the players. We were down 0-1 and Portsmouth had by far been better than us in the first semifinal so the pressure upon the players was low. We were out so we could just as well play our chance. Nobody would be disappointed if we failed. We got behind after just 8 minutes but Harvey Cribb scored just a few minutes later so we were still in the game.(aggregate 1-2) . Anthony Donovan made it 2-1 (aggregate: 2-2) in 42nd minute but unfortunately Portsmouth scored just a few minutes later. In the final ten minutes we pushed hard for a goal and it was a great pleasure to see Youssef Yahyaoui score his first goal for us after his loan spell (good timing😉). Aggregate 3-3 and injury time! However, Portsmouth scored again and this time we did not come back. 3-3 and we were out…. But what a season. A very young squad and with no-one expectingus to survive relegation and now we had been so close to playoff final at Wembley. A sixth place in League One makes us no. 50 in England. Not bad for a small club from a small town. Matthew Dawes had been a fine addition in our attack and Gareth Delaney in midfield had pushed Andrés de Gracia out to the bench and orhe young players were pushing for our first team so I looked with great pleasure toward next season. Our preferred lineup: Our finances were very fine and I was happy that the Board agreed to invest more in our youth academy. Perhaps we could develop better players in future! 😀 Thanks for reading!😄 Edited June 18, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
OleDK Posted June 19, 2023 Author Share Posted June 19, 2023 (edited) Pre-season 2028 (League One) With a good financial basis and good results last season I was in a good position to negotiate with the Board and after they said yes to my request for an improved youth development budget in May I tried my luck once more at the Board - and they said yes again! 😉 we could now look forward to improved training facilities in November at a cost of £400K! It was great to experience all those permanent improvements. A brand new stadium and improvements for our youth department and now better training facilities. But Hungerford still is a very small club with facilities far from our competitors’ so we were definitely still punching extremely above our weight. If any doubted on our position than league rivals from Plymouth proved the point by poaching one of our talents (a talent not yet part of the Youth Intake in the spring) showing to everyone who is the “Big Brother” here. I will remember this, Plymouth! Our position was underlined by the financial status compared to our league rivals. Bolton’s sponsorship earning are 30 times larger than ours not easy to maintain being competitive🤨 Our low status was also recognized by the bookmakers. Our odds were even worse than last year’s odds ? But hey bumble bees can’t fly either - but yet they do! We will show them will we! The transfer window started out fine for us. Ryan Wainwright, a natural WBL who I believed I could retrain to AML and latertried to retrain him to DL but I had to give up on both attempts so I transfer listed him and sold him for £230K so not a bad mistake to sign him afterall….🤑 We received a £250K bid for young midfielder Harrison Hamilton who had three first team matches last season but I decided to turn it down. The money was good but I believe Hamilton may develop further. I believe we are better off with keeping him at Hungerford…. ….that is until Stoke came with an improved offer of £675K…. After some negotiations I ended selling Harrison Hamilton for a record sum of 1 million £ 🤑🤑🤑 this has boosted our financials to a new level. More than £1.5 million in cash and more than £400K in net future transfer payment. Not enough to wipe out our stadium loans (remaining debt £2.7 million) but it was going that way. So everything is going great and the manager seems to be in control of everything 😀 or is he…. NO Some of our profile players have too small release clause amounts in their contracts from when we were playing in League Two and our biggest profile - goalkeeper Nicola Castelli - has a release clause in his contract of only £165K and Charlton took advantage of this by making a bid on the player 😩👎 I was devastated 😱. Frustrated 😳 and angry 😡. At myself! How could I have missed this? Not to secure our most important player against too low bids due to a low release clause amount? Was I even qualified for my job? I played the next friendly match without Castelli - we had to prepare our squad for a future without Nicola Castelli 🥵 But then these very positive news arrived - Castelli had turned down the Charlton offer 👍 The fact that Hungerford is one of his favoured clubs and that I am categorized as favoured personnel made it come out to our favour I think but this was close…. Must renew his contract very soon! After this very unpleasant experience we seemed to have our squad for the season ready with some interesting new additions: Lewis Holden, 21 years, DLC, free transfer from Torquay in 2026 - been on loan spells at Chelmsford (VNS) and Aldershot (VNL) Stuart Martin, 20 years, DC/DMC, free transfer from Leeds (a defender with great aerial presence) Barry Rose, 21 years, DR/WBR/DMC, returned after loan spell at AFC Wimbledon (VNN) - national player for Barbados Nathaniel Nicholas, 18 years, MC/STC, free transfer from Brighton And not less than 3 AMR/STC players to compete for first team matches in our offensive positions. Simon Maloney, 19 years, free transfer from Wolverhampton Junior Wood, 18 years, free transfer from Manchester City And finally Bradley Spencer, 18 years, free transfer from Bournemouth We had strengthened the team in positions where a better depth was required (STC and DC). I believe that Stuart Martin in central defence and Nathaniel Nicholas in central midfield and players like Bradley Spencer and Junior Wood in our offensive positions will be playing a good deal of our matches. I believe we have a stronger squad this season (doesn’t bother too much about the bookmaker predictions…) Thanks for reading !😀 Edited June 20, 2023 by OleDK Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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