THORFINN – A Sporting and Social Revolution Begins

[phnompenhandy]

FEBRUARY

 

With the transfer window drawing to a close, the only player clubs were interested in, Kevin Lisle, signed a new contract with us, but then I received a complaint from Connolly. It’s second-keeper syndrome – we’ve been here before. I could only hope I’d placated him enough for him to stay patient for 4 more days. The window closes without incident – here; in another world, Rangers sols a player to the Saudis for £124 million!

We got off to a slightly rocky start, against rivals Rovers. We launched 25 shots, chalked up a 4xG to nil, yet they burgled a 1-1 draw. We were amused to see Riddle stuck on the bench, apparently his usual position. Carloway are now 1^st and the gap to 4th was down to 5 points. Still, the performance was good enough – wins were imminent.

We were away to bottom-feeder Pentland United next. Calm heads (mine) prevailed but I had to drop Smith, the star player on the worst run of form, restoring Davidson to the left wing and starting club captain Cameron. And Saliji – a monster in training sessions, but far less imposing than he appears in actual matches. I also gave Connolly a second chance in goal. We had to win and we did – just. Davidson back as an inside forward struck twice as we scraped home 2-1. Three precious points - we’d take it – the new year starts here!

At Ness in a thoroughly unpleasant game in rain, hail and sleet, Zoubs mistimed a tackle and went off early as we fought to a 1-1 draw. We couldn’t wait for the days to lengthen and weather to improve before we rediscovered our form – I couldn’t let it show, but I was starting to worry.

Glass half full - undefeated. Glass half empty - falling away. Look:

Please don't let us be 4th out of 4.

Some sarcastic hack throws us a backhand compliment. We're guaranteed to finish higher than 12th. Terrific

Edited November 25, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

MARCH

 

Actually, the four-week break that followed the game at Ness was just what we needed. The days lengthened, Spring broke, the weather (marginally) improved, and we had sufficient time in training sessions to reset (again). We also had the opportunity in 3 friendlies I’d arranged to try something new – counter-pressing. I figured the lads were fitter and rested, and could manage the extra energy for a few games.

I hardly knew him, but I was always wary of him – Callum McLean, our erstwhile and short-lived Head of Youth Development left us. Got some lucrative UN managerial position. ‘Get your recruitment chops together, board – we need the new intake properly organised; they’re due in about six weeks.’

 Carol, Astrid and whoever else talent-spots brought us this lady – and quickly too. They obviously had notice of Callum’s intentions. She seems very pleasant and they’re paying her decent money – staff wages were already our biggest monthly expense, and now they’ll be spiralling further. Still, I won’t judge until I see what intake I get, and whether she’s still employed by us then. My initial thought is she’ll be head-hunted even quicker than Callum was.

The results of the three friendlies looked better than the performances merited, but by the end of the third I felt the counter-pressing was starting to take effect and hopefully would bring marginal gains.

Back in league action, however, the first result was disappointing. We smashed Brora Wanders in xG, as is so often the case, but we’ve lost our cutting edge (not helped by Zoubi being suspended) and only drew 1-1. Restoring Smith to the first team was a mistake – he’s been brilliant for us, but his head’s gone.

Well, this lady doesn’t mess about! A good month earlier than I’d expected she and Astrid were ready to deliver us a new academy intake. Astrid stressed that these boys were believed to have real potential for this level, but that none would likely get in the first team squad for a while.

I left them in the hands of Astrid and her scouting team to settle them in Kirkwall while I prepared for hosting Staxigoe. We’d just beaten them in a friendly – could we repeat the result when it mattered?

Oh yes, and how! We’d spotted our opponents were very weak down their left flank in the friendly, so I instructed our right back Ryan Laing to fill his boots. He only plundered a hat-trick as we massacred them 6-1. Given this was from an xG of 1.7, it indicated our shooting boots were back in the nick of time. It did wonders for morale and thrilled the new kids watching their first Thorfinn game.

We had one more game in March, a must-win tie at Tongue. After that, our next two matches were against the third and fourth-placed teams, and we’re not great under duress.  Ah, same old. We won the xG and drew the match – 0-0. Sigh. We had two massive games up next; draws would be adequate to be fair, but not losses.

Hotspurs helped us by beating United, so maybe the table doesn't look so depressing

I'm also a continental coach

This'll be huge if we win promotion - I'll plan out individual training sessions for my players, providing the board stump up a few quid for equipment.

Now if you'll excuse me, I needed to size up the new kids.

Edited November 25, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

APRIL

 

With Lydia only being in the post for just over a month, she was only able to bring in four asylum-seekers. We have a right back, two wingers and a midfielder. To avoid diplomatic incidents, we have to ‘pretend’ the Rohingya is from Bangladesh and the Tibetan from Bhutan. We also have a dissent from Hong Kong and a lad who fled civil war in the Central African Republic. Astris has been as good as her word and delivered us twelve Orcadian lads, supplementing all positions I use, although as she forewarned me, they’ll be on the fringe of the first team at best.

The match against Stornoway United was huge. There were nerves. Darren Macadie came on as a late substitute and put us up in the 93^rd minute, and when the referee blew his whistle in the 95^th we thought we’d secured promotion – but no! It was a penalty to United. The 2-2 draw was crushingly disappointing, but the big picture is that although we didn’t secure promotion, we are one point shy of it with three games to go.

High stakes, late drama

And a wee look at the table ahead of our next game

(It's a 34-game season)

We'll get a point from somewhere (and United will drop some) to win promotion, aye, but now it's all about the bragging rights for second; us versus renegade skipper Riddle's hotshots. This means more!

 

Edited November 25, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[Stuniverse]

4 hours ago, phnompenhandy said:

Okay, yes, this was a terrible start to the year. But we're still top - just.

How many get promoted?

4 hours ago, phnompenhandy said:

In lashing rain, with queasy stomachs and against a very physical opponent, we went down 1-2 to end our 13-game unbeaten run. Hopefully this would be our last mid-week fixture.

We took the long drive south to Black Isle to face Balintore – formerly runaway leaders, since then they’d lost their mojo.

Beautiful scenery, @phnompenhandy. I hope you're still getting chance to enjoy it in the depths of Winter.

[phnompenhandy]

1 minute ago, Stuniverse said:

How many get promoted?

Beautiful scenery, @phnompenhandy. I hope you're still getting chance to enjoy it in the depths of Winter.

[phnompenhandy]

2 minutes ago, Stuniverse said:

How many get promoted?

34 games, 3 promoted. We're so nearly there. Next post ....

[Stuniverse]

6 minutes ago, phnompenhandy said:

34 games, 3 promoted. We're so nearly there. Next post ....

🤞⚽️🍀

[phnompenhandy]

Only one game, but HUUUUUGGEEE!!!!

 

We took the new boys straight back to school – the Kirkwall decider was to be played at the Grammar School most of them attend (bear in mind they haven’t done their school-leaving exams yet).

Well my goodness! When they needed a performance, they put on the best display of flowing football I’ve ever seen from this team. I’m so proud!

 

Even Zoubs, who's been off-form for months, turned it on

 

And about the "travelling fans", i.e. our academy intake; here they are:

We'll have a closer look when I've had a closer look (next preseason). Now we've secured promotion, I might risk 2nd place by giving debuts to two or three of these kids in the last two matches.

 

"Housekeeping" note:

Spoiler

The numbers on the right are CA/PA. I only activate them to ensure the "asylum-seekers" don't have higher abilities than the academic intake kids they replace. In fact, the foreign ones have lower abilities. Having them makes me realise staff 'star' assessments of  'ability'  correlate exactly with these numbers, and also the raw numbers are NOT good guides to how good the players actually are.

 

Edited November 25, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[Stuniverse]

24 minutes ago, phnompenhandy said:

Well my goodness! When they needed a performance, they put on the best display of flowing football I’ve ever seen from this team. I’m so proud!

Congratulations! Nicely done, @phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

After a couple of training sessions during the week, I sent out the same Starting XI that secured us promotion against Lochs, with five new kids on the bench. The quality of play was outstanding again, even if the score was a more modest 2-0. It secured us the runner-up spot behind Carloway.

By the way, the three teams that got promoted from Division Two last season have all gained a second promotion. Will us three follow suit? I’m getting ahead of myself.

Eleven players have absolutely cemented themselves in my plans for next season. For the last fixture, at Embo, I would use as a trial for the noobs.

Embo - wee village, big caravan site, even bigger beach

Like a preseason friendly, the result was unimportant (okay, 1-4 since you ask), but really, I learnt more than I would in 3 or 4 friendlies. In a nutshell I learned that the new intake is nowhere near first team standard. I’m also increasingly aware that if Alan Smith doesn’t rediscover his mojo, I’ll be desperately short of wingers/inside forwards next season.

I also got a strong sense that a lot of these kids have a great deal of potential. That’s probably to our disadvantage – success brings unwanted notice; I rather fear we’ll put a huge effort into developing these players only for them to be poached with no remuneration to the club. It’s urgent that we collectively foster a strong community spirit so that the local lads won’t want to leave Orkney (not without a living wage), and the migrants and their families will feel happy and secure here.

We have a squad of 40. I’ll release 4 or 5 but we still urgency need another coach or two. It would also be great if we had an Under 18s squad next season – not in a league, but so that I can observe the kids in regular friendlies. That’s probably beyond the board’s financial means, but I’ll ask anyway.

 

April results

Final table

Edited November 25, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

JUNE 2025

 

Our new league, Division One.

As expected, the bookies expect us to do well. The board and fans demand a top half finish, but the players and staff think we can bag another promotion.

Confusingly (to me), only the three promoted clubs, ourselves, Hotspurs and Carloway have turned semi-pro. The other 13 are all still amateur. I don't know if that will make any difference on the pitch, but I suppose it's a measure of the ambitions of the clubs, especially after seeing all three clubs that got promoted from Division 2 in the first season rise again, and maybe Carloway and Hotspurs also have NW Skye's success in mind. It's all a bit over my head - I leave the politics to the politicians (or 'diplomats' as the UN team like to think of themselves), or "strategists". It all benefits the club and myself - until we fail to get promoted and the debts mount up. Best not to think about that, eh?

Most of our opponents this season come from the same area, down the A9 on the North Sea coast of Sutherland and Easter Ross, with Halkirk and Wick Groat a bit nearer to us in Caithness. Carloway, Hotspurs and ourselves are the only island teams other than Sleat & Strath on Skye. Gairloch/Aultbea, Kyle (of Lochalsh) and Lochbroom in Ullapool are on the west coast. In general, there’s less travelling, and with 16 teams in the division, 4 fewer matches.

I know where the bookies are coming from: Carloway are quietly following the same strategy that we are - they are building up a youth coaching and recruitment base in the Western Isles outside Stornoway and maybe taking in the west coast of the mainland too. They intend to hunt down Stornoway Athletic and become the dominant team of the Western Isles. Sleat & Strath consider themselves the second team on Skye and now that NW Skye has raised the island's profile, they intend to benefit from that. Due to Ullapool's fancy 3G pitch and indoor facilities, Lochbroom are attracting west coast attention. I don't think any of the east coast sides, the ones nearest us, are in the picture. That's good news for us, with our recruitment team sending scouts to seek out ambitious schoolboys.

Attendance grew fivefold last season, with average attendance at our home games over 100. More supporters means more demands and higher expectations.

You might expect us to play like Brazil; I'm promising nothing of the sort.

Thanks for the new contract, Carol. Thanks for the badges, accommodation, car hire and other expenses. But if you expect me to reduce my day job hours to spend more time at the club, you’re going to have to pay me, like you pay everyone else. My patience is not infinite. Nat Bubb left us for a better-paid position as Sports Scientist at tier 6 side Burghead Thistle.

Despite my grump, I have to spend more time at the club. I asked for an Under 18s squad and the board granted my request – providing I manage it as they won’t provide extra staffing.

We lost one coach and gained two new ones.

 

 

Yes, the quality and number of coaching staff is outstanding for this level; it's what we invest in rather than paying higher bonuses for older players. But with a squad of 36 and the most rudimentary facilities, we're stretched to the limit and standards suffer. Even before I start my individual training programmes, our workload is like this:

 

Astrid also decided not to renew her scouts’ contracts and seek new ones due to my request to restructure the scouting missions to focus on youth recruitment. First to arrive was Stuart, who’d had a long playing career in the Highland League (tier 5), with 15 years at Forres Mechanics. Martin Jablonski stays as chief scout, as she says he knows the regional education system and is a good organiser.

Might as well meet them

She'll be hiring one or two more.

We acquired one more staff member - one I hope to be working closely with. I put in a request to Astrid for a Performance analyst now that I'm to be fully responsible for tactics and training. Turns out there'd be chat amongst the latest intake that one of their grammar school maths teachers was particularly interested in our project, so when Astrid approached her, she jumped at the chance. Welcome, Alice.

A squad of 36, not 40? I had to release some good men and one not so good. Cenk Munro has done a sterling job at fullback, but at 27, he needs to give way to up-and-coming youths. New Zealander Sam Lochrie was on the fringe of midfield for two years but never convinced me, and at 26, I feel he’s had enough time. Alan Smith was an absolute star for us on the left wing, frequently our best player, winning us many games, until about halfway through last season when he just lost it. He hasn’t shown any sense of a determined attitude in preseason, so reluctantly, I’ve concluded that his best is behind him, and we need to move on with younger hungrier players. I quickly decided that one of the schoolboys was out of place in the squad and let him go too.

Okay, we have six weeks of preseason to sort the boys out. I'll be back when the season gets underway in mid-August.

Edited November 27, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[Stuniverse]

4 hours ago, phnompenhandy said:

As expected, the bookies expect us to do well. The board and fans demand a top half finish, but the players and staff think we can bag another promotion.

The challenge is on then.

4 hours ago, phnompenhandy said:

Attendance grew fivefold last season, with average attendance at our home games over 100. More supporters means more demands and higher expectations.

Hopefully the steady growth will continue.

4 hours ago, phnompenhandy said:

We lost one coach and gained two new ones.

4 hours ago, phnompenhandy said:

A squad of 36, not 40? I had to release some good men and one not so good.

A smaller squad, albeit only four less, will be less of a strain on your Backroom staff.

4 hours ago, phnompenhandy said:

Okay, we have six weeks of preseason to sort the boys out. I'll be back when the season gets underway in mid-August.

Good luck, although it sounds like you’re already well positioned for another successful campaign.

[phnompenhandy]

2 hours ago, Stuniverse said:

A smaller squad, albeit only four less, will be less of a strain on your Backroom staff.

There are sweet spots where if you reduce your squad by one more, the workload on coaches decreases. I don't know where it is here, but it ain't 36. Over time, I'll find the youths or who don't pull their weight, give me attitude, and maybe I'll take losses in the transfer window.

 

I did ask for improved training facilities, know full well we don't have the resources. Flat out refused, obvs. But I am on my UEFA B badge which, on completion, should allow me to add one or two half-stars to a couple of categories.

[phnompenhandy]

An important if unscheduled report as a result of a defining board meeting:

The successful second season showed me that we really do have something here – a club that can, in time, go places. It might take a few years; whereas three teams get promoted to the Highland Premier Division, after that there is a troublesome bottleneck. Only the champion of the 11^th tier gets a shot at promotion, and that’s in a play-off with the bottom club in the 10^th tier West of Scotland 4th Division. That had never happened before, reinforcing the view that Highland clubs are not properly competitive. However, this time North West Skye broke the mould and have inspired us to follow suit if we stream-roller our way through the next two tiers.

I don’t mind taking a few years to consolidate, anyway. In conjunction with the board, we’ve devised a new philosophy – I’m changed with inculcating into the club an “Orkney DNA”. Carol informs me that I’m now the most highly-qualified coach in not just the archipelago (Nb Caledonian North League’s Orkney have just lost their manager and no, I’m not defecting to our increasingly serious rivals) but the entire North East of Scotland (maybe second only to the manager of the enormously ambitious NW Skye*?), I should put my talents to full use.

“Orkney DNA” means devising a specific and distinctive style of play, in conjunction with the board’s desired culture. I’ll do that by moulding the young players through general and individual training programmes and team tactics. There’s no money to improve facilities or increase staffing further, but again, the scouting department is being rejigged according to my requirements to ensure that future intakes are closely in line with my youth player requirements.

 

 

I will, therefore, be focusing and reporting on the progress of individual players far more in this upcoming season.

 

* n.b. I semi fell in love with North West Skye and did a career with them back in January, as related here:

The Evolving Story of DUNVEGAN CASTLE FC

I loved that narrative, and it involved creating my "Highland DNA" that I shall doubtless plagiarise from, but lately I found out that the MacLeods of Dunvegan were responsible for a grizzly massacre in Scottish history - worse than if less infamous than the Glencoe Massacre. Here they holed up over 100 MacDonalds in the cave on Eigg, many of whom were women and children, and lit a fire at the entrance, choking them all to death. I couldn't bring myself to promote the values of a club with that kind of history.

And aye, I know the Viking history of Orkney isn't exactly utopian, but you have to draw a red line somewhere. Skye is still my favourite place on earth though - I might create another new club based there in the future.

Edited November 26, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[Stuniverse]

5 hours ago, phnompenhandy said:

I did ask for improved training facilities, know full well we don't have the resources. Flat out refused, obvs. But I am on my UEFA B badge which, on completion, should allow me to add one or two half-stars to a couple of categories.

🤞 Good luck.

Edited November 26, 2023 by Stuniverse

[Stuniverse]

3 hours ago, phnompenhandy said:

* n.b. I semi fell in love with North West Skye and did a career with them back in January, as related here:

The Evolving Story of DUNVEGAN CASTLE FC

I loved that narrative, and it involved creating my "Highland DNA" that I shall doubtless plagiarise from, but lately I found out that the MacLeods of Dunvegan were responsible for a grizzly massacre in Scottish history - worse than if less infamous than the Glencoe Massacre. Here they holed up over 100 MacDonalds in the cave on Eigg, many of whom were women and children, and lit a fire at the entrance, choking them all to death. I couldn't bring myself to promote the values of a club with that kind of history.

And aye, I know the Viking history of Orkney isn't exactly utopian, but you have to draw a red line somewhere. Skye is still my favourite place on earth though - I might create another new club based there in the future.

Feels like you're coming home, @phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

I've called the whole squad and all the staff in for two special preseason meetings to impart the DNA philosophy.   I explained that in the beginning, when the squad was small, we needed generalists - defenders who could do any job along the back line, midfielders, wingers and forwards who were flexible enough to take on any role and duty. But now, with a large squad, the intention is to specialise. I have eleven positions, and in each position I have allocated a specific role and duty. Now, some of you might feel it's not your optimum skill set. I'm saying that you need to fit into the club's structure - you have to change to carry the DNA. If you can't do it, two other players in your position will take precedence. These positions, roles and duties are not yet set in stone - some tweaking will be done in the early days, but the overall structure is being established now.

While each position, role and duty has its specific skills that need honing through playing experience and individual training, one skill is essential for every outfield player - speed.  A key aspect of Orkney DNA is moving and thinking quickly, so everyone will be relentlessly drilled in quickness training. There's no point in moaning about it - it's not negotiable. Initially, for the first half of the season you'll all be doing it; in the second half you'll be taught specific skills depending on where and how I need you to play.

We have restructured our scouting and recruitment philosophy. As well as making specific requirements to coaches of Orkney schools' football teams, we have a worldwide UN refugee scouting network that is responsive to my requirements. If I see a position is a weak point - i.e. not one of you is suited to it, I will have it filled by an academy incomer. Anyone who does not feel versatile enough to subordinate their ego to the good of the club is welcome to let us know, and we'll find you another club. For those of you who stay onboard, you'll be aware of the ambition and success of North West Skye - we're following the trail that they are blazing. We're going to put football and the community in Kirkwall on the national and international map. Who wants to be part of that?!

 

Here is the outline of our structure and incomplete chart of individual training emphases. It will be filled out as preseason progresses.

[phnompenhandy]

14 minutes ago, Stuniverse said:

Feels like you're coming home, @phnompenhandy

Well, literally so, actually. I structured the three Highland Amateur divisions geographically. It's the Premier Division (tier 11) that started with all the Skye-based clubs. NW Skye has got promoted, and we'll meet some who've been relegated - although one has succumbed to a double-relegation and passes us on the way down. But in the next year or two we will be very much 'home' on Skye. I feel like NW Skye should be a future rival along with Orkney FC - how long before we get to play them?

[Stuniverse]

9 minutes ago, phnompenhandy said:

I've called the whole squad and all the staff in for two special preseason meetings to impart the DNA philosophy.

Derby County, the football club I support, have a marketing strap line that seems appropriate here.

It’s in your DNA youth.

[phnompenhandy]

3 minutes ago, Stuniverse said:

Derby County, the football club I support, have a marketing strap line that seems appropriate here.

It’s in your DNA youth.

Nice. My interpretation of a club's DNA may well be totally phony, as it's not based on my own research into what club's actually do (although it is a light interpretation of a YouTuber and SI employee Jack Sarah's FM23 YouTube series of Burton-based 'England DNA').  You're welcome to indicate where I diverge or come up short.

[Stuniverse]

50 minutes ago, phnompenhandy said:

You're welcome to indicate where I diverge or come up short.

I would have no idea either 

[phnompenhandy]

With the invaluable assistance of Alice Dixon, I can now offer Player analysis

Initially, there seems to be nothing separating the goalkeepers. But on closer analysis, Miller hare is way ahead in the two key skills of reflexes and agility. Agazade has good reflexes too, making him a suitable second keeper. Billy Connolly repeatedly complains he’s not getting enough first team action. He’s going to need to spend time with the Under 18s for a year and work hard on improving those key skills. Or, if he’s not happy, he can leave.

(just giving you a taster of analyses to come)

At right back, the well-established Ryan Laing has done a fine job for two seasons, but new Rohingya kid Rana is super-fast and that’s what I prioritise. If his defending is hopeless, I’ll make Laing first choice, but as the unknown yet exciting quantity, Rana will start the first friendlies.

I’ve been using our Kosovan Don Saliji in various defensive roles due to his speed, but never found his best one. I’m inclined to experiment with him at left back for the start of preseason because analysing him still indicates there’s a very good defender in there. If he doesn’t click, Durie did well least season and has plenty more to offer.

With Saliji not really working out as a central defender, of the six I have, none have any pace whatsoever, forcing me to play a low backline. This contradicts the philosophy of Orkney DNA, so I’m going to have to make do while putting them all through quickness drills all the while nagging the recruitment bods to find pacy centre backs in the future. Not, therefore, being a position to experiment, Lisle and later Cuthbert proved reliable and my initial assumption was that they will be first choice again. Two kids – McNamee and Millar were due to deputise unless the Under 18 squad defenders impressed me.  But then I did a closer analysis, comparing Lisle and Millar. Lisle had the edge physically and Millar mentally. But I realised that with Lisle being 30, he’ll go into decline – maybe not this year but soon. Millar on the other hand has the mentals and is very determined. Given plenty of first team experience, he could improve rapidly, so I’ve inclined to making him first choice for now.

I never settled on the best roles and duties for my midfield pairing last season, and I’m still unsure. All three mainstays of last season are in the running – Barker, Akdag and Ikechukwu and they’re joined by a new kid in Joe Miller, cousin of goalkeeper Paul. I will need to decide on roles quickly and stick with them as this is the engine room of the whole operation. They all enjoy the thug life of ball-winning destroyers, but I’d rather develop a more cultured philosophy for future purposes and so I’m going to start with a deep-lying playmaker and a box-to-box midfielder although if the latter isn’t successful, I can always devolve to the thuggish option.

Last season I often let my wingers decide on their preferred roles – standard wingers, inverted wingers, and inside forwards. On my coaching course we looked at the extremely low success rate of crossing in the best of teams and we ain’t that; for me inside forward on both flanks is the way – we started like that in our first season and deviating from it brought no improvements.  The problem is we only have one established player on each flank assuming Davidson reverts to the flank after enjoying himself so much up top. He and Gardiner-Evans will reprise their roles (although the latter looks like he is starting to runout of juice as Smith did last season).

Khalife played on the right last season, but only as a winger and so needs to work on learning the inside forward role. There are three potentially decent youngsters, Tibetan Nima, Central African Mabide and Orcadian Cole Bell.

Up top, it’s as you were, No forwards came through, so Al-Zoubi and Cameron will continue in their roles (although with Cameron often being dropped due to inconsistent form, I’ve stripped him of the captaincy to give it to Barker. Darren Macadie and Afghan Naurozi will back them up unless Under 18 Grammar Schoolboys Kennedy and Zupancic shine.

 

The provisional first team and Under 18s squads before we get underway

 

Edited November 26, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

Had meetings with the scouts who know the teams in this league. Sobering stuff. See here:

Apart from central defence, we have the speedster to fit my tactic. Our kids will get bullied off the ball if they dither, and we do tire and concede late goals.

A youthful side will compare poorly mentality-wise. I need to be very clear in my instructions and not expect them to express themselves or improvise.

We're not going to get anything from set pieces. If we're going to succeed, it will be through superior tactics, not skills.

Edited November 27, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

Are Paul Miller's reflexes going to be enough for him to play at this level?

As you know, the pace is down the flanks. The central defenders will get caught out, but at least they can put in a solid tackle when needed.

The engine is spluttering badly. We didn't break down last season; will the midfield prove adequate this season? Questionable.

We're better off keeping the ball on the grass, but we did well for most of last season - I'm not sure any of our forwards have the capacity to improve, but hopefully they'll be good enough to shoot us up the league.

We have to be absolutely realistic here - at barely 18 years of age, we have by far the youngest squad in the league.  I have to take that into account in designing my tactics, but can't use it as an excuse.

Edited November 27, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

END OF PRESEASON

I wanted to gather as much data as I could now that I had an assistant handy with a computer, algorithms and all that stuff that sails right over my head. So we played 12 friendlies over 6 weeks, 5 of them against our Under 18 team. I felt that there was no other way to try every players' combination to be really sure I knew my best team going into the season.

 

Obviously, the results look great on the surface, but what they mostly tell you is that our opponents were even less fit than we were. We didn’t arrange for any really challenging opponents because the purpose was to get to see my players playing together and getting familiar with my tactics.

It’s useful to eliminate the early games and assess the players by the last five matches. It makes for pleasant reading (far right of table).

 

Valuable lessons were learned. Initially, both my right back picks, Rana and Laing lacked stamina and were not in the right role and duty. Rana clearly doesn’t want to do much defending, so I gave them a wingback on attack duty and reverted the right-sided midfielder to a ball-winning hacker with a defend duty to cover for the flying fullback. It took a few games, but eventually both looked dangerous and could complete 90 minutes.

Al-Zoubi was starting to struggle as Pressing Forward so he changed to an Attacking Forward. It seems to work. I had high hopes for the Tibetan, Tshewang Nima, but he has surprisingly poor stamina for someone born and raised in the Himalayas, and he’s undisciplined in training. It would have set a bad example to pick him, so he was banished to the U18s to grow up a bit, and that opened a space for Cole Bell on the left wing. He’s excelling, opening up the possibility of Davidson returning to his cherished striker role if Cameron goes off the boil.

With 22 players in the preseason squad, that left 13 for the U18 squad. The bad news is that to a last one, they are truly woeful. I think I’ll spare them humiliating matches when the season commences and see how they are after nine months of my training regimes.  

Actually, that's not quite fair. It's true of nine of them, including Connolly whom I feel has complained his way out of the club. But there are four for whom I can sense real potential. Unfortunately, I have five attacking forwards, so the two new intake kids are down the pecking order, but I do think Kennedy and Zupancic have what it takes to come good. And in our troubled engine-room, we have two midfielders who do look good, but I just can't work out which roles and duties work best for them - except to say it isn't the ones that best suit the first-team choices. so hopefully over the season, Chun Hung and Fulton will either adapt, or I'll figure out how best to introduce them into the first team. As for the rest, over time I need to work out who is definitely deadwood as they are a drag on our coaching workload.

Our most influential player, 30-year-old Kevin Lisle must have read what I posted about him; he certainly saw the writing on the ball and took the opportunity to depart for Wester Ross to join Glenelg. The prospect of Cuthbert and four very raw and unready kids being all I had available for two centre back spots filled me with dread., so despite all I said earlier, I decided the best available option was to restore Saliji to the centre.

The board were so impressed by my use of the analytics, that they sanctioned one of Alice’s Higher Maths students to do a bit of weekend data collection as he watches the matches. A very big welcome to young Kyle!

Well, we've put an inordinate amount of work into our preseason. Whether all the effort will pay off remains to be seen, but I really don't think we left any stone unturned.

Whew, I think I've earned myself an unpaid day off. See you when the season begins!

Edited November 27, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

AUGUST

For our first competitive match in Highland Amateur Division One at home to Gairloch-Aultbea, I elected to start Davidson up top with Al-Zoubi, as I was confident that Bell could handle starting on the left wing. Ikechukku held down his ball-winning midfielder spot, Miller had the gloves and everyone else was in the role they’d been practising all preseason.

I went to a balanced mentality so we could see where we stood in this new challenge but all team instructions were the same as we finished the previous season with apart from reverting to the higher D-line with Saliji’s pace to enable that and one other key change – I felt we were fit enough to try counter-pressing, for parts of a game anyway.

We didn’t stay balanced for long – we were 2-0 up inside 5 minutes, so I decided to go for the jugular and send a message to the rest of the league. We broke our club record with a phenomenal 9-0 thrashing; Gardiner-Evans got a personal record in scoring 4 goals; his combination with Rana down the right flank was blistering. United barely ever got out of their half; they never had a shot We mean business!

For the next Saturday, we hit the A9 after the ferry down to Dingwall and across country to Kyle of Lochalsh. With social media giving away far too many trade secrets, we expected opponents now to batten down the hatches and protect their left flanks; would we have enough guile to adapt?

Kyle is the mainland end of the Skye bridge

As expected, this game was much tighter. We ran out 3-1 winners, but it was clear we couldn’t let our concentration or levels dip in this league. After two games, I could see Durie was struggling with the energy needed for his left wingback role and Laing looked keen coming off the bench for him.

It was Liam Little who impressed in training and made his debut at left back; otherwise, it was ‘as you were’ for the visit of Contin for our final August match-up. Their plan to intimidate us came a cropper when they had a man sent off in the first minute! With them having to stand off us, we danced around them and smashed them in an 8-1 slaughter. Again, Rana and Gardiner-Evans were unbelievable down the right, and the Little/Bell Grammar School combo matched them on the left. I have to say, this is all down to the meticulous preseason preparation we did, as the players, staff, board and fans all acknowledge. This is scintillating stuff – who will work out how to stop us?

Just as the transfer window was about to close, we lost a player. This didn’t enormously surprise me, to be honest, and I’m not sad even if the fans are. Scott Cameron played 60 games for us as Target Forward over the last two seasons. He was club captain when Davidson usurped his place last season, and thinking he wasn’t nailed on, I gave the captaincy to Barker. Cameron never forgave me that. I started this preseason playing Davidson on the left and therefore Cameron got his place back, leaving me wondering if I’d made a mistake in stripping him of the armband. However, having brought Davidson back as striker and dumping Cameron back on the bench, I figured he wouldn’t sit quietly. Now he’s upped sticks and gone to Tomatin United. We’ve lost our two most influential players in Lisle and Cameron, leaving us with no actual leaders at all; but on the other hand, the squad I have left are very much MY squad. On balance, I think this is for the best. I might need to figure out a new role for that left-sided striker though, and on the hoof, as there is no time for experimentation in friendlies.

Best of luck Scott, no hard feelings

 

Ridiculous start

 

And yet, damned tough crowd to please, these social media warriors!

 

Edited November 27, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[Stuniverse]

Great early start to the season, @phnompenhandy.

As you thought, initial signs are not much difference in overall standard between this division and the one you were promoted from last season.

[phnompenhandy]

1 minute ago, Stuniverse said:

Great early start to the season, @phnompenhandy.

As you thought, initial signs are not much difference in overall standard between this division and the one you were promoted from last season.

Yes, my sense is that at amateur level, where players come and go and facilities are minimal, clubs are much of a muchness unless the odd one has an ambitious board (i.e. money), which appears to be the case with NW Skye and maybe one or more Western Isles teams. I think this season is in the bag, and I'll probably race though it and not post on all the matches. But as I say, next season looks like I'll be jostling with three other very strong teams for one spot. And as you'll find out in my next post, the board is not likely to take failure to win a third successive promotion lightly!

[phnompenhandy]

Just been looking around: in the next division, tier 11 all the clubs are semi-pro. In the West of Scotland 4th (tier 10) there are a few with unbelievable Youth Recruitment and impressive training and youth facilities (which are accurate according to real life). For all that, NW Skye currently top the table. Then I looked closely, and they do indeed suck up all the best schoolboy recruits from Skye and Lochalsh. It looks like my fictional Dunvegan Castle narrative carried over into this universe! So, yeah, proper challenges lie in the not-too-distant future.

[Stuniverse]

One step at a time, @phnompenhandy. You need to win promotion first, whilst planning for the division above.

Good luck 🍀⚽️🤞

[phnompenhandy]

7 minutes ago, Stuniverse said:

One step at a time, @phnompenhandy. You need to win promotion first, whilst planning for the division above.

Good luck 🍀⚽️🤞

About that .....

[phnompenhandy]

SEPTEMBER

Maybe Cameron’s departure was unfortunate timing – the next match was a hop over the Pentland Firth to face our old rivals John O’Groats in the First Round of the Billy Cup. I had forgotten Davidson was suspended for that game, so I did have to trial a new role with no preparation after all. I had one half-hour training session to workout which of four strikers would play a role I hadn’t decided upon. I considered a Deep-Lying Forward to compliment Zoubs as Advanced Forward, but I found I simply couldn’t explain and trial what I wanted in the time I had, so for that match I went with two Attacking Forwards; initially the plan was to use the pace of Afghan Ismat Naurozi. He played nine games last season, 4 on the right wing and 5 as Target Forward, but at least he had first team experience which would do for now. But then my assistant Freya reminded me that Darren Macadie was a tad quicker, is left-footed and played well as an Advanced Forward three times in preseason, albeit against our hapless Under 18s. that seemed the safer option so I went with him.

Macadie justified his inclusion by scoring a brace. The double-Advanced Forward combo wasn’t entirely smooth, but did well enough to warrant giving another try. We proved our fitness by scoring three after 90 minutes, albeit all from substitutes. We ran away with the game 6-1. Only dark cloud – we drew Carloway in the next round. I do have this sense that only four clubs, all in the Western Isles, are stronger than us in the Highland Amateur scene – Stornoway Athletic, Westside, Harris and Carloway. Those first three, after double-promotions, are already the top three in the Premier League. Only one can join NW Skye this season, leaving two with presumably Carloway and ourselves, to contest the title and chance of a play-off for promotion.

We had a fortnight before our next match, time I used to focus on Attacking drills with the purpose to acclimatise all our strikers with playing as an Advanced Forward. They all took to it with the worrying exception of Davidson, who was reluctant to let goof his Target Forward muscle-memory.

The other two matches in September were against Easter Ross villages, Avoch and Evanton’s Black Rock Rovers.  

Avoch

Down at Avoch we put in a very sub-par performance, dropping our first points in a 0-0 draw. It’s a match we should have won anyway, with Barker having a penalty saved by an inspired keeper. Macadie plain didn’t work. I’d try someone else against second-placed Blackrock Rovers. I had complacently left Davidson out of the squad for the Avoch match; he was immediately restored (and played as a Target Forward one last time) as captain Barker was dropped for Akdag – strong messages need to be sent. The encounter was uncomfortably close, but Davidson was the difference as we won 1-0.

The good times ended early this season. Now we have to get right in the head and fight for every point. Carloway and Wickies are knocking in 6s and 7s now - we've not been punished for our complacency yet. Hopefully we've learned in time.

Edited November 27, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

During the week off, a very important development occurred.The start we’ve made to the season has been causing a buzz around town, and I was dimly aware of a flurry of activity in the Pickaquoy Leisure Centre, from which we rent the football pitch. It turns out that Carol and the other Orkney-based board members have been canvassing views among the users of the Centre. It appears that while Big Brother Orkney FC are running into trouble, with attendances falling below 100, support and good will in the town is rapidly transferring to us, largely due to our asylum-seekers policy. How is this relevant? Well, votes have been held and negotiations undertaken. Carol called me in and said something exciting is unfolding, but so much depends on me, that I must give my solemn undertaking never to quit. She said the club will look after me, including offering me a quite comfortable suite to live in at the club’s expense, in the Pickaquoy Centre where I will be accessible to the club at all times.

So what’s this big deal. Carol wanted to stress what a financial commitment the board were prepared to make, and how deeply in the red we’d be, but they’d been mulling over my request from months ago to provide better training facilities. They’ve done a deal with the Pickaquoy Centre to rent the gym, swimming pool and other fitness apparatus, exclusively for two mornings per week for the senior squad, plus Sunday mornings for the Under 18s. We have to wait for a few months for memberships to run out or be renegotiated, but by Christmas, we’ll have the use of some top-notch equipment. A lot of the squad are complaining about my training regime being too much for them, so hopefully they’ll be happy with the upgrade. Nothing's finalised yet; we need to keep winning in order to keep this enthusiasm alive until documents are signed.

 

 

 

 

Edited November 27, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

OCTOBER

The month began with a match at Tain. We beat Thistle on their ground in the Billy Pot back in ’23 when we had our false honeymoon. The outcome was again uncomfortably close as we ran out 2-1 victors. Not only did Gardiner-Evans beak Lisle’s record for Thorfinn appearances, but at the other end of the spectrum, academy intake youths have quietly been added to the matchday squad until Bryan Fulton’s debut made it five of them – four Orcadians (Miller in goal, Little and Bell being the others) and Rana started the game. That is the plan, to gradually pension off the old guard, but I hadn’t realised how quickly it was happening.

The lads absolutely understood the gravity of the next fixture – it was Carloway in the Billy Tinpot, the knock-out cup we felt we could and should win. But this match – we’ve played Carloway four times and lost three. We needed big players, and looking around we only had Gardiner-Evans and Laing who were old hands in their 20s. With Rana running out of juice, Laing came in a right back – as a fullback.

In a dour clash between two sides that no each other well, very few chances were created. Entertaining it was not. BUT, we edged it 2-1. Yes! William Turner Challenge Cup – we’re coming for yea.

The next league game was against high-flying Lochbroom. On the Saturday morning I felt I needed to freshen things up as one or two important players were starting to get a bit jaded. But then I realised all my backs ups were exhausted due to playing 90 minutes on Wednesday in readiness for what was to come. The return of Rana swashbuckling his way down the right wing livened up the attack, but the defence gave away two low xG goals and we drew 2-2. Carloway overtake us at the top.

“What was to come” was Wednesday nights. Our success in the cup meant two October midweek ties.  The first would be down in Fortrose.

 

My own team, Loch Ness FC, groundshare here

There would be four debuts for academy kids as Nima and Mabide would get their chances on the wings, and McNamee would join fringe player Millar as our central defensive unit. That central defence pairing was flaky, but the inside forwards Mabide and Nima came through to give us another narrow 2-1 victory.

I’d misjudged Nima (or he was playing games early on). His stamina is fine – so good that I deemed him able to start the next match three days later. That match would be on Skye against Sleat & Strath, playing in Broadford.

Our opponents played far better than their lowly position suggested, but with 15 shots on target (but not Barker’s penalty), we were able to win, albeit in a nerve-jangling 4-3 victory. Bell came off the bench to replace a very disappointing Nima and nabbed the winner.

Our second Wednesday night match was at home to struggling Dornoch City. 4-1. Always on top. A comfortable win, with Central African newboy Mabide leading the way including converting a penalty at last. I’m a recent convert to comfortable wins after biting my nails through this month. Whew! And back on top, too.

Now, there are those who might sneer and say we've been lucky this month. In every match we smashed the opposition in terms of xG. Our defence has been sloppy, and our attack has been adjusting to new roles. We'll get back to comfortable wins soon enough; in the meantime, they do say champions find a way to win even when playing poorly, right?

 

 

 

[phnompenhandy]

Here are some profiles - up-and-coming kids who should feature prominently for us in months to come:

I realise I have to be careful not to over-play them. I've already returned Agazade to the goal as academy kid Miller was losing his concentration, and Bell is starting to show youthful inconsistency. Nima's going to be a mercurial genius, causing me no end of stress. Note how many I play "out of position".

Edited November 27, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

NOVEMBER

Despite our outwards success and my bravado, I was having sleepless nights over the precarity of our position and subpar performances. I thought I’d cracked it in preseason, but clearly there was more work to be done to fine-tune our tactics.

I’d like to get to a point where I can ‘lock down’ Orkney DNA with fixed positions, roles and duties so that specialised training drills can take effect. At this point, things are still fluid. I know we are too leaky at the back, but the core reason is that my centre backs lack the necessary qualities, and there’s no more I can do until better ones come to the club. In the meantime, I’ll focus on outscoring the opposition. In that regard, I’m still trying to figure out the best way to use a second striker – persist with a second Advanced Forward? Clever cookie Kyle showed me why that’s not a good idea:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the Dornoch game on the left, my two Advanced Forwards were on top of each other. In the next game against Point, my strikers had different roles and were adequately spaced out. I now know what not to do - the key is to work out what the best combo is.

Revert to Pressing Forward but work on their Strength as none are adequate yet? Use the slowest ones as Poachers?  I do think the best role to complement my Advanced Forward and Inside Forwards is a Deep-Lying Forward, but that requires more skills than my or any striker at this level would have. So, three options to experiment with, with six different strikers (including even Al-Zoubi who’s starting to go a bit stale), all the while trying to win matches. And I have one more thought – with my midfield never gelling to my satisfaction, I want to try a Mezzala. Probably a mistake, but hey.

 

Right, I can’t do too much all at once, so this will take a while; who knows, maybe I’ll have figured out a successful formula in time for our upgraded training facilities. Oh, and when they settle and are happier with the facilities and thus accept a higher workload, I want to get started on increasing their specialisms with training certain traits.

November kicked off with two cup ties, one we needed to win and the other we probably wouldn’t. At home to Point in the Billy, I felt confident enough to try two new roles, Barker as a Mezzala (it took a while to explain that wasn’t a South African musical instrument that makes the bagpipes sound like a harp), and Davidson as a Deep-Lying Forward. The 5-1 score line suggested it was very successful; Barker and Davidson both scored and enjoyed their new roles. However, this may have been mostly due to the weakness of the Division Two opposition; we’d need to trial it against a tough team to really know.

The next match was in the Scottish Amateur Cup against very strong opposition – leading the 7^th tier Caledonian Amateur Premier League is Blantyre Soccer Academy – one of those super-academies established in Scotland that we can only dream of.

We lost to a vastly superior opponent, 2-4. The outcome was never in doubt and as I say every year, I’m relieved to be out of that competition. I still learnt a lot – our scorers were Barker and Davidson again. They have cemented those new roles; Barker in particular, as club captain, has a new lease of life, feeling confident and demonstrated leadership qualities. I tried partnering Davidson with Macadie as a poacher – that wasn’t satisfying, but nailing two roles with one to go is ahead of the curve.

We now had three league games in a week, so I needed to show some skill in squad management. My method was to put out a weaker team and home to Halkirk on the Saturday, my strongest team on the Wednesday at Black Rock Rovers, rest them and go again with the same squad at Carloway three days later. I had the immediate problem that my left back, Little, had picked up an injury, and so I was short of a rotation option there. Kennedy was the next kid to be trialled, as a Poacher alongside Al-Zoubi.

4-0 was a great result and performance. Any of these starters could be considered for the Carloway match a week hence if players starting the Wednesday game were disappointing or tired, especially goalkeeper Miller and left winger Bell who were buzzing after being rested.

We saw in the news that former Head of Youth Development Callum McLean, who left us rather quickly to take up a management post, got his team relegated and has now been fired. A reminder that both players and staff that leave us, never seem to prosper.

On paper, a 1-1 draw at Black Rock was a decent result, but we squandered a ton of chances, with latest Poacher trialist Naurozi going missing.

 

We had to see the Fyrish Monument, the only thing Evanton is known for (it’s on Rovers’ logo) – a folly built to give work to Highlands cleared out of their homes to make way for sheep

Based on the last two matches, I altered my plan and retained only Cuthbert and Davidson from that starting XI, the other places going to players who impressed in the Halkirk match. Carloway was determined to get their revenge on us and put us under pressure for 90-plus minutes, butt hanks mainly to our young inside forwards Bell and Mabide, we prevailed and came away from Lewis with a 4-2 victory and small cushion at the top of the table.

The month was rounded off with a trip back to the Grammar School to face our old rivals, Hotspurs.   Attacking combo de jour was Davidson with Carrot-top (Kennedy) as Pressing forward this time. Seven school alumni lined up against their alma mater – no motivation was required for this one. Grudges, intimidation, dark arts – it was all there; quality was not. It was Carrot who broke the deadlock with the only goal in the game. 1-0, bragging rights are ours.

November was a tricky month; I’d say we’ve come through it better than expected and are in a good position going forwards.

Note our inside forwards tearing it up in the league. If he can find more maturity and consistency, Nima has the talent to join them.

 

With no midweek matches in December and four modest opponents lined up to face us, we could spend more time on the training ground trying out roles and tactics. We've also received the good news that the availability of the facilities at the Pickaquoy Centre is proceeding as planned.

Edited November 28, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

DECEMBER

I’m looking far ahead now, but I’ve decided that key components of my Orkney DNA are acceleration and pace, passing and composure. I want us to control and dominate matches. Of the current squad, no one has all for qualities; Barker and Davidson have the last two but not the legs; others are quick but can’t pass or keep cool under pressure. But it’s useful to have a clear idea what qualities to ask our recruitment people to look for.

We coasted past Cromarty 3-1. Carrot Kennedy has introduced himself as our in-form striker as others blow hot and cold. Nima is back with the Under 18s, not being able to maintain his brief flashes. We won 2-0 at Wick and then beat Kyle 4-1. The year concluded with a 3-0 victory at Gairloch-Aultbea.

Aultbea - where's the ground? Not there!

Gairloch lies in the shadow of Gruinard Island. The MoD thought they try some biological warfare experiments during the War and laced the place with anthrax.

They say it's safe now

The month turned out to be as routine as I’d expected. Others were stumbling though, opening up a huge gap between us and 4^th spot, with three going up.

This put the whole community in optimistic mood as we took part in a cutting-the-ribbon ceremony to mark our deal with the Pickaquoy Centre. The Tuesday and Thursday physical training session swill be now be hi-tech. At the event, I garnered extra cheers by brandishing my UEFA B coaching licence.

As I mentioned, once they’ve bedded in, I intend to ask the players whose roles are established to train in appropriate traits. If I push some too far and their form suffers a little, I feel we have a big enough cushion to tolerate a few less-than-ideal results.

Youth Intake preview – you can see the recruitment department has taken onboard my requests – they are looking for central defenders, central midfielders and strikers. It doesn’t look like the quality will be too impressive, but there’s four months to go yet, and it doesn’t exclude who the UNHRC people can root out.

 

Amidst all the positivity, there is one issue - not my direct concern, but still. Where there's gain, there's pain:

 

[Stuniverse]

Don't want to jinx anything so I'm not commenting on your league position.

As you're into the cold winter months, do you get many matches postponed?

Sounds like the DNA is coming along nicely in theory, but getting the players to bring that DNA to life on the pitch is proving more problematic.

[phnompenhandy]

3 minutes ago, Stuniverse said:

Don't want to jinx anything so I'm not commenting on your league position.

As you're into the cold winter months, do you get many matches postponed?

Sounds like the DNA is coming along nicely in theory, but getting the players to bring that DNA to life on the pitch is proving more problematic.

Don't worry, I repeatedly jinx myself. Whenever I get overly confident, instant karma smacks me in the face!

The weather: unfortunately, "out of the box" FM has only one Scottish climate, named 'Scottish Lowland'. Last year I was using "daveincid"'s fantastic 'extra realism' files which includes one with extra weather - one category being 'Scottish Highlands & Islands' with extra rain and cold temperatures. I started this save before his FM24 updates are out - my next save will doubtless add them. I think he said this new weather mod will include modifiers to reflect climate breakdown, i.e. more extreme temperatures and weather. The lack of realistic weather in this save works greatly to my advantage - with the realism mod, I'd have plenty of postponements and mega-chaos. In this save, I've only noticed Shetland having a lot of matches called off so far.

The DNA: yes, there's no way players at this level will have the requisite attributes, so I'm very much fumbling in that direction. In the short term, I'd be better without the philosophy and just redesign my tactics according to whatever arrives in each intake, but the concept gives me an extra challenge and that keeps me more interested.

[phnompenhandy]

JANUARY 2026

We drove down to Contin on the other side of Dingwall.

Given the margin for error, I felt bold enough to give debuts to two more academy kids, Mark Horne and Joe Miller (with his cousin Paul on the bench to give Connolly the gloves). The debutants were a bit overwhelmed, although not as much as Chun Hung who, making his first start of the season, got red carded after half an hour. Little followed him a half hour later as we were reduced to 9. We lost 0-2. Of the top 5, only Lochbroom won so the damage was mitigated.

We just about squeezed past Avoch 3-2. The newbies did weaken the performance, but did well enough to deserve a third chance. It’s a tricky balancing act; I’m trying to preserve our position and gain promotion, but at the same time bring the more inexperienced youths into the first team to try them out in live combat. Playing Under 18s friendlies just isn’t the same – who will rise to the challenge, and who will be culled in May? Everyone needs a fair crack.

 

The next match was just over the Firth at Helmsdale United.

They got relegated from the First Division last season, and are floundering near the bottom of the second. Nevertheless, they made it to the Quarters of the Billy T, and stood between us and the semi-final. We swatted them aside, nae bother, thanks to a Mabide brace. 2-0. What will be a bother is that our semi-final opponent will be Westside at their place on Lewis, and the other semi will be contested between Harris FC and Black Rock. No more easy rides in this competition.

The new kids were starting to settle in and play flowing football. We overwhelmed Tain Thistle 5-1 despite the sleet. Each of the chasing pack take turns to trip up, making our position more secure by the week. Up in Ullapool Lochbroom, who have strong promotion aspirations, held us 1-1.

If my maths is correct, with eight games left, three wins will see us up. We play the bottom club next.

It turned out the squad was too big for all to use new facilities; during the transfer window, we allowed six fringe players to find new clubs. 

Agazade and Naurozi were all picked up by clubs in Aberdeenshire; their families were glad to be heading to southern landlocked soil. Durie made a move to the same county.

J Brown, Akdag and Khalife were released (Akdag was doing well, but has ambitions outwith football, and Khalife got a post as liaison officer with the asylum-seeking community).

 It turned out the board had negotiated certain grants for the hiring of the fitness facilities, so the club debt isn’t as bad as it looked in the books.

Edited November 28, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

FEBRUARY

At home to bottom side Sleat & Strath from Skye, four players started their first game of the season, meaning that all 29 of my squad have now started first team matches. I’ll give the fringe players match experience in five of the final league games while saving my strongest side for the cup games(s), Carloway and Hotspurs.

It was the ideal match to introduce some fresh blood. Bryans announced his return to right back with a hat trick of assists, and the Brown brothers had good debuts. 5-0 was a very pleasing result.

Our next match was at relegation-threatened Dornoch.

 

How this wee place is a 'city', I do not know.

 

I put out a strong team, not primarily to secure the promotion three points would guarantee us, but because I needed a match-fit Starting XI for the following week’s semi-final. A 5-1 win did indeed secure promotion. We kept celebrations mute, as we’d be up against it in the next match.

Over to the Western Isles to face a very intimidating Westside. My selection for that match “raised a few eyebrows”. I dropped fan (and board) favourites Gardiner-Evans and Al-Zoubi to the bench. As a manager you have to be constantly alert to the fact that a player can have a brilliant season or two, but then peak and go into decline, and I sensed that we’ve seen the best of those two. Youngsters Mabide and Kennedy are the future and have enough energy about them for the present – what I couldn’t be sure about was whether they’d cope with the occasion – but then the favourites were on the bench to rectify any error on my part. It did mean the entire Starting XI was 16 or 17 years old, though.

And we done ‘em! Maybe a bit unjust, we had to soak up a lot of pressure, but Carrot Top broke and nabbed a winner. 2-1 to us! Our first win against Westside! We’ll face Harris FC in the final at Ross County’s stadium in Dingwall. We’ll have to play without Rana and Gardiner-Evans, who are now suspended.

 

Fabulous February!

 

We’d not won any silverware under my stewardship and we were in a shout of two trophies here. The next match could effectively be a title-decider, with second-placed Carloway coming to the Pickaquoy, a match brought forward due to our participation in that William Turner Challenge Cup final. They’d grabbed the Second Division trophy – it was our turn!

On an associated point regarding ruthless management, Ryan Laing came to me to point out that as a ‘regular starter’, I was no longer starting him regularly. He was quite right, of course. As one of only three senior players left (i.e. in their 20s and here when I took over the management of the club), he’s been a stalwart servant but is fading, while Rana has come in as a marauding right back and done wonders, and now Bryans is reminding me he can do a job as backup. It’s just natural evolution. Fortunately, Laing has accepted his reduced status gallantly.  I’ll have a decision to make over whether to retain him next season.

 

I mentioned that I was going to start getting the players to specialise in learning traits while they were still young enough to learn new tricks. For wingbacks Bryans and Little – get forward when possible. Captain Barker, mezzala – try killer balls. Forwards – Davidson and Kennedy – round the keeper; Zupancic – try first time shots.

I accept most if not all will be a waste of time as both players and coaching staff are light on requisite skills, but I figured at this time of year little harm can be done. You’ll also notice that my improvement as a coach has allowed my staff to spend time on teaching the traits.

To be fair, none of us are great at physical training, as much as I value and prioritise it. Part of the package the club is to pay Pickaquoy for includes the qualified staff personal fitness trainers when our boys use the equipment and running track, leaving my staff and I to focus on the footballing side of things.

And whisper this quietly, but I’m beginning to sense that the ambitions of the club are leaving my assistant manager Freja behind. She’s a lovely lady, and we have a great working relationship, but we are going to need better coaching than she can provide. She’s one of the UN clique and close to Astrid and Carol, so as long as the Project takes priority over the football, I guess I’d better keep schtum.

[phnompenhandy]

MARCH

 

Carol mugged me into signing a new contract

As per, I get expenses, emotional blackmail and as much fresh air and smirr as I can eat in lieu of an actual salary.

The required playing style looks demanding, but we do teach set piece routines even if we’ve only scored 9 goals from them, we do now counter-press and whilst our style is by no means possession-based, the board seem to feel we cover that base. At least they’re not setting any defensive requirements or making any complaints – to be fair, we have tightened up, only conceding more than one goal twice in the last three months.

The fans still don't rate me. No reason

 

Maybe because of this

They have their favourites but see, it’s the ones at the top that stagnate, and I have to let go.

Carloway – they beat us three out of four times in Division Two, but this season we’ve got the better of them twice. I guess they just wanted it more. It was a dogfight in a rainstorm, but they came out on top as we fell to a 1-3 defeat. It’s all to play for.

Despite that result throwing the title race wide open, I stuck to the plan and played my fringe players against Fortrose, with an eye to the future. Goal difference would not be an issue, but we needed three points. 4-3 was too close for comfort, but the points were in the bag, and freshie boys Zupancic, Joe Miller and Alan Brown got our goals. Unfortunately, Brown, on his second start, talked himself out of future appearances by ranting at my ‘harsh’ halftime teamtalk. No place for snowflakes in this squad, Alan. On a similar note, Nima continues to be a thorn in my side. I’m convinced he has bags of potential (although my staff aren’t), but he’s talking his way out of my plans. He is our fastest player though, and I do need speed down the flanks. I’ll think on it.

I sent my strongest line-up to beat Halkirk to ensure they’d be match- and mentally fit for the following week’s cup final. My old nemesis David Riddle started and slammed in two goals; it wasn’t enough as we scraped home 5-4. Maybe not the best preparation for the following match.

I took my stopwatch to the running track to assess how much progress the squad had made after eight months of ‘quickness training’. None of them had made any more than the most marginal of gains. I’d be diversifying their individual training.

We have access to a separate training ground now, as well as the running track.

 

Great news arrived at the wrong time

 

I’d be leaving them in the hands of my staff while I focused on the final.

 

Edited November 29, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

THE WILLIAM TURNER CHALLENGE CUP FINAL

After the Halkirk game, I made a few changes. I dropped Miller in goal, and Rana (his 5^th booking in the Halkirk game reminded me that he was suspended for the cup final!), bringing in old hands Connolly and Laing. Macadie came in for an off-form Davidson and Hong Kong’s Yung Chun Hung took on the role of destroyer, with the condition that he didn’t get himself sent off in this game.

When we got to Dingwall it sunk in that this was by far the biggest game in the entire history of the club.

Woah!

 

We were starting to get affected by nerves, whilst the Harris squad, with them lying a distant third behind title-chasing Stornoway Athletic and Westside, looked really determined to nab a trophy here.

I instructed the two full backs to be very conservative rather than their usual adventurous selves, but otherwise, instructed the players to be themselves (i.e. as I’d moulded them). We were 1-4 down with just over five minutes to go, when substitute Davidson started driving us forward. We scored three late goals to equalise 4-4, but having chalked up 3.0 xG in those last few minutes alone, were unlucky not to win in normal time. Our nerves reasserted themselves in the penalty shoot-out, and we lost that 1-4 with only Laing scoring. We’re all proud of the lads, but it wasn’t to be our day.

With an attendance of 1,168, the £2,000 in gate receipts pleased the board, too They tactfully didn’t comment (to my face) on the £10,000 prize money that got away.

 

Not great

 

In the next report, we'll finish the season and bring you the 'excellent' academy intake -- the "golden generation".

Edited November 29, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

APRIL-MAY

With the coaching staff having put the academy intake through their paces, and former player Fouade Khalife doing a sterling job introducing the foreign, asylum-seeking, youths to the club, three final league matches a fortnight apart gave me the opportunity to organise friendlies to thoroughly assess our intake and decide who to retain and let go from our existing squad.

I must say, in terms of raw talent, Astrid hit the nail right on the head with “golden generation”. I am gobsmacked. After a couple of weeks of getting to know them, however, I found that I was a bit disappointed. What is it with young people today?  They all know that this club has become a very serious enterprise, yet I don’t see any with the ambition or determination to really want it. I suppose there is a silver lining here – there was no rancour when I signed up a Macadie whilst releasing one brother and having previously released the other.

It would probably be a good idea to keep the senior players on to mentor these mentally weak children, but  Astrid insisted I cut the squad to a maximum of 33, and with 16 promising Orcadians and four asylum-seekers, I had to terminate the Thorfinn careers or 14 of our players; the three aforementioned senior players – Laing, Darren Macadie, and the season’s top scorer and fan-favourite Gardiner-Evans (I think I was influenced by the fact that the fans look down on me anyway, so sod ‘em), three of my first local intake – Connolly, Ikechukwu and Irvine, five of the last intake -  Horne, Andy Smith, Joe Miller, Jack Brown and finally Alan Brown for his rant at me, the silly boy. Three of the asylum seekers also left – Al-Zoubi who seemed to have faded away despite being only 19, Chun Hung whom I can’t find the right role for – he enjoys playing as a ball-winner but is too brutal, and regretfully, my fastest player in Nima, whose general immaturity has left me out of patience. I expect the better servants of the club to find new ones over the summer.

 

So long, and all the best!

Of the 16 Orcadian youth, only one gave me attitude and was released, so I’ve kept on 15, supplemented with 4 asylum-seekers, all Asians this year, a Kurd from Iran, Yazidi from Iraq, a casualty of the Pakistan border wars and a North Korean defector.

Currently, the club has been responsible for settling 17 refugee families in Orkney. Seven of their sons are in our squad now; ten other families are either still on the islands or have been resettled elsewhere in Scotland.

Back to the league and Cole Bell hauled us over the line with the winner in a 2-1 victory over neighbours Hotspurs, leaving us needing one more victory for the title. I’m bedding in academy prospects while risking handing the title to Carloway here.

However, while our match at Cromarty was called off due to the weather, Carloway dropped two points, meaning when we played our game three days later, we knew a point would be enough. We went one (or two) better than that, with a 1-0 victory to seal the title. We’d be presented with the trophy in our own town, our own ground on the final day!

My first (?) trophy!

We weren’t completely focused in the game against Wick and were lucky to win 3-2.

 

North West Skye gained a triple-promotion - there's no sign of them slowing down. Stornoway Athletic also did a treble of winning the Scottish Amateur Cup, Premier League, and then the promotion play-off. Looking ahead, Westside and Harris FC have squads vastly superior to others in the Premier League, and ours. We shouldn’t be able to compete with those two clubs. Then again, player-for-player, Carloway has a stronger squad than us, and we did beat Westside and draw with Harris – and our intake does strengthen the overall squad. I honestly don’t know how next season will go, although I’m confident of meeting the board’s requirement of a top half finish.

 

In my next report, i'll present some of our exciting "golden" academy scholars.

Edited November 29, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

Here's the full first team and Under 18s squad for next season

 

And here's a trio of newbies I'm quite excited about

Goalkeeper

From Ontario to Orkney. He's not one of the Grammar School gang; he went to Firth School in Finstown where Rendall play. He's quick.

Left Back

Jaber is a Yazidi from Iraq. He and especially his sisters went through some things when captured by ISIS. The family is still quite traumatised, but they're getting a lot of care in the asylum community, and I'm hoping he'll be ready to join us after the break. He's also very quick, and I'm hoping he'll be as effective as Rana is on the left.

 

Midfield

Jung's family escaped from North Korea. Like most of the intake, he doesn't fit the speedy profile for Orkney DNA, but you can't have it all. A bit like Hung this season, I'm not sure how to get the bet out of him. It doesn't help that we had a miscommunication as we don't speak a word of each other's language, and he's a bit miserable now. Hopefully things will be fine when we all get together for preseason. Looking at all my midfielders, I've decided to abandon the mezzala role for now (or forever) and return to the more conventional deep-lying playmaker. Scott Barker (I have to say 'Scott' now as his two younger brothers, Phil and Ryan are in the squad) can manage both roles, but no one else can (Hazanzadeh says he can - we'll see). Jung here looks like he could be a playmaker or a ball-winner - or indeed go conservative and be a regular generalist in central midfield. I've still not found a formula for midfield - ball-winners can get carried away and pick up too many cards, but we might be too flaky through the middle without them. All the other positions and roles are settled, so I think I'll be able to work out what's best for midfield when we get together in July.

Edited November 29, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[Stuniverse]

7 hours ago, phnompenhandy said:

My first (?) trophy!

👍🏆⚽️

[phnompenhandy]

JUNE – JULY 2026

 

Highland Premier League odds:

Ullapool FC are big brother to Lochbroom, but they’re based at the High School rather than the town’s nasty 3G pitch. The three sides we know well and fear are predicted to finish above us – indeed, the media dream team contains 6 from Carloway, 3 from Westside and the other two from Harris.

Easterhouse and St. Peters are relegated sides from the Glaswegian region outside the scope of our local knowledge, as are Oban, Rothesay and Isle of Arran – all too southerly for our intel. Lairg and Kinlochbervie are in Sutherland, Portree United, Kyleakin and Staffin on Skye and Glenelg and Plockton face the famous island. Most of this league (14 teams) reside in some of my favourite places on the planet, so long away trips will be very emotional for me. I’m almost happy to forego wages in order to enjoy these journeys for free. Having said that, as sole representatives of Orkney, our nearest destination, Lairg, is not far short of 200 km, or eight hours by water and road each way. Calling us “part-time” is a bit of a joke when you consider the travelling. You’ll also notice we have 18 teams in this league, so four more league matches than last season.

We arranged nine preseason friendlies, three with our Under 18 side and the others against lower league local opposition – remember, I use these opportunities to get everyone fit, tweak tactics and assess the whole squad. The first six league games are against modest opposition, so we have time to get up to speed before we meet our serious challengers.

 

We started preseason with a couple of matches in three days against our Under 18s. In the first I started unfamiliar faces on both sides, and in the second used the same tactics with last season’s team. From the start, I just made two tactical tweaks to encourage more flowing, entertaining football. I’ve previously mentioned restoring a Deep-Lying Playmaker; the second was to change the Pressing Forward’s duty to defensive in order to bring in the inside forwards a bit more. This is because I felt that in the latter part of the previous season, my strikers were losing their edge and inside forwards not getting enough chances. It’s easy enough to tinker with support and attack duties if needs be.

In those first two games the players were waking from a summer doze and I didn’t learn anything significant other than the two tactical tweaks looked positive. As the month wore on however, it became increasingly apparent that the academy intake crowd were well off the pace. The problem is mental – they’re a bunch of snowflakes, whingeing about training and so on. A number of them complained that we started preseason too early – how are they not chomping at the bit to get going? We’re not a bumbling, happy-go-lucky bunch of amateurs any more. I fear their collective low determination and ambition will hurt us over the season. We’ll see how it goes, but I might need hungrier refugees who come to us after a hard life rather than more grammar school softies.  When I brought my concerns to Astrid, she looked exasperated, telling me that she’ll need to find a team of psychologists rather than talent-spotters for her local scouting team.

We still have the last two friendlies to play, but the patterns are set. The defensive Pressing forward isn't working too well, but otherwise, what we have is a first-choice eleven picking up from last season, and their inexperienced backups (locals only; not refugees) needing more time and maturity.

Our most influential players, captain Scott Barker and defender David Cuthbert, have been the focus of transfer window vultures, but thus far thankfully, they’ve held firm.

Nearly all our attempts to teach new traits ended in failure, but Scott Barker our playmaker will try to play killer balls, and backup right wingback Stu Bryans will try to get forward more in emulation of Rana.

Edited November 30, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

AUGUST

 

As we rolled into August and close to the start of the season, new vice-captain David Cuthbert did leave us, for Cupar Hearts in Edinburgh. I had to reorganise my defence

The season started with an intense four games in two weeks, commencing with a trip to the Trotternish peninsula in north Skye to face Staffin AFC.

You can just see the team's most illustrious fan, The Old Man of Storr peeking over the ridge

Staffin AFC’s been losing players to NW Skye in recent times, but has a stable squad that knows each other inside out.  Nobody else knows them inside out, but the club is famous for one thing - the story of Maradona and the shirt. Here it told here:

Barker showed his leadership chops by hauling in hat trick in a morale-boosting 6-2 victory.  Two home ties rapidly followed; we saw off Plockton 3-0, and Isle of Arran 2-1. I had targeted those three opening fixtures as free hits, but the performances were very pleasing, with our thorough preparation ensuring every player knew their job.

Edited November 30, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

SEPTEMBER

 

Driving the length of the northern tip of Britain from John O’Groats to Cape Wrath took us to the little fishing village of Kinlochbervie.

I think we went into the match guilty of a little over-confidence. We were too casual and only drew 1-1. With barely time to gather our thought, I had to use our squad depth to put a team out to play the other Sutherland side, Lairg Rovers. They actually played much better and should have cruised to victory, but lapses at the back meant we ended up drawing at home 3-3. I’m not ready to say we’re mentally a bit frailer than I’d like, but we have just dropped four points in the first week of September.

We had two away ties in the second half of September; down in Evanton to face Black Rock and out west at Harris FC. I picked the most experienced guys and trusted that tougher opponents would bring out the better side of us.

That’s exactly what happened. I witnessed good football at last; Cole Bell earning a Player of the Match award but keeper Andreano saving two certain goals to deliver a 4-2 win at Rovers, and 2-0 at Harris.

As I suspected, it’s all about attitude, and in those games, we had it. The challenge is to match it with consistency.

I don't mind this for now - Rothesay is my family home. But only the champions can compete for a promotion. Second is nowhere.

Edited November 30, 2023 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

OCTOBER

 

The next match would be our eighth clash with Carloway. I sent out our most experienced side and we knew it would be a dour, entertainment—free battle and so it proved. It also proved that Carloway knew us too well, we lost our long 12-match unbeaten run in a 1-2 defeat.

It was a set-back, but these are early days. Next, we had two matches at home to the same opponent, struggling Glenelg, first in the Billy Cup and then in the league, with a trip to relegated St. Peter’s of Renfrew sandwiched between.  

Down in Renfrew - bit congested in the ol' metropolis

 

That would be our first encounter with a former West of Scotland side, a marker I was looking forward to. Those games were dispatched efficiently, 4-0, 4-1 and 3-1; for the third encounter I felt confident to send out a ‘weakened’ side as out cup success meant we had a midweek match at dangerous Ullapool. The quick turnaround for the match at Kinlochbervie for the Billy Cup second round tie meant that my on-form ‘second XI’ played again. In a game of no decent chances, Ullapool held us to a 0-0 draw, while we went into the Billy Pot tie at Kinlochbervie with some trepidation. They were on good form, had already held us, and what’s more, all being well, this season would be our last chance to lay our hands on the trophy, having blown it in the final last season. They played very well, but our boys turned on the after-burners late in the game and we ran out 3-2 victors.

 

At the end of October, we’re ominously sandwiched between Westside, Carloway and Harris FC.

 

All 22 first team squad players are getting game time. If we can manage to build up a healthy lead, I’ll gradually introduce the best of the rest languishing in the Under 18s, although I can see that might not be possible this season.

Ever since I took over the training over a year ago, I’ve had players moaning about the workload, the quality, the staff, any excuse. I’ve always ignored them, trusting in my methods and believing the snowflakes need toughening up. I’ve been proved right – month after month the number of complainers drop by one until now there are just three regulars – Saliji, the Kosovan fake tough-nut, Dallas the reserve goalkeeper, and Fulton, backup midfielder. The rest have by now knuckled down, use the facilities the club has put at their disposal, and trust the process. Of course, many have subpar weeks, but that’s human nature. I consider that a success.

Weakness – defence

 

According to the data brought to me by Alice and Kyle, our poorest players are consistently our central defenders and the defensive midfielders ‘protecting’ them. Cuthbert is a loss, but none of the five we have, or three ball-winners, are stepping up. Comparing us with our divisional rivals shows we’re not doing bad, relatively speaking, but it’s a frustration, and can’t really be fixed until we acquire better defenders.

Edited December 1, 2023 by phnompenhandy