Inverting the Pyramid/Rapid Globe-Trotting

[phnompenhandy]

This is a two-manager story. Some of you might prefer the one-club guy and his impossible task. Others might enjoy the adventurous manageress who never stays in one place for more than a year. I love both, hence the double-narrative.

The first campaign utilises this new database

 

THE BACKGROUND

A UK government commission into financial shenanigans in league football came to a dramatic conclusion – corruption and false accounting have been endemic problems, and every high-level club is guilty – but, the commission deduced, the more powerful the club is, the more culpable it is. So in conjunction with the PL, EFL and lower league authorities, an extreme punishment has been imposed – an inversion of the entire pyramid.

Top-tier teams are collectively fined billions and relegated to the 7^th tier. They will have to cope with the resultant financial issues (particularly Manchester City who were mercilessly hammered). Saudi Arabia, UAE and Qatar were deemed deeply culpable, and no transfer activity is permitted with clubs from those nations; their teams are no longer a cheat code to offload players for silly money.

Tier 7 teams are promoted to the top tier and benefit from the redistribution of the cash. A couple of English teams (MK Dons and Millwall) couldn’t adjust and went bust, to be replaced by small Scottish outfits, a reformed Loch Ness and a team from Skye). All the teams in the SPFL and a number of league and non-league teams from Wales and both Irelands took up the offer to join the new British pyramid too.

Edited Friday at 15:09 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

Andy McNessie is a one-club man. That club is Loch Ness FC in the seventh tier of the British pyramid. This is not an Academy-Only job; Andy can use the market; his problem is the quality of the teams around him. The demoted teams will relentlessly rise to the top. How can Loch Ness even compete at this level? The only way it can is by astutely using the funds available to the wee clubs from the sums confiscated from the giants.  Even with money, however, attracting decent players when there are so many tempting choices all around is not straightforward.

[in the holiday test I just did, Loch Ness ended the season with two points!]

 

We'll be keeping an eye on this parallel tier 7 division

It will be interesting to see how quickly the top English clubs resume their dominance, and with such a loss of funds, if they'll ever compete in Europe again. It will also be interesting to see if their star players desert to Europe or higher up the pyramid. If there are any clubs you'd like updated on, just let me know.

[phnompenhandy]

Daenerys Targaryan's new mission is to stay one season at a club then move onto a new nation, whether she won a trophy or not. She can only move up the ranking ladder (a max of ten places) if she wins a trophy.  Dany can only manage nations non registered with FIFA until she wins some trophies. In addition to the nations at the bottom of the list, she can now manage in - Liechtenstein, Monaco, San Marino, Vatican City, Crimea and Rapa Nui (Isle of Man along with Guernsey and Jersey are clubs in the British pyramid).

Altogether, there are 31 nations not part of the FIFA family, and I have loaded 52 leagues from 29 nations [with the option of adding every nation that has never qualified for a World Cup finals (I think there are 127) at a later date. I have 62,000 players, including all from UK & Ireland].

Here's a reminder of the bottom-ranked nations in FIFA:

 

For the earliest stages of her career, these nations have been loaded:

[phnompenhandy]

So Dany begins her adventure in Rapa Nui.

"Where?" I hear you ask. Here:

"Nope, not a clue", you think. But why the long face - you know it!

Yeah, 'Easter Island' to the uninformed. "All very well, but this is a fantasy too far - there's no football on this island". "Oh yeah?"

And this is Dany's team

I see your eyebrows are arched now! I'm reading about it

 

[phnompenhandy]

As for Andy McNessie, if you've been following my threads, you'll know Loch Ness already

 

Every time I manage Loch Ness, the first season is a nightmare. The squad is dominated by senior veterans who've done it all around the Highland non-league and are not for listening to instruction. Well, not this time. I don't need to be patient and wait for them to pick up their pensions.  There's money in the kitty - Andy is going on a shopping spree.

Edited Friday at 16:09 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

Dany had time to sort out her squad before the season got underway, but Andy was thrown straight in. Fortunately, after losing all the preseason friendlies, his first competitive match was a local low-stakes cup tie.

Having no managerial experience, he decided to set up a very straightforward 4-4-2 with few instructions. He had to start preseason with the shower he inherited, and the results reflected that. But he was busy trying to build a squad that fitted his vision, both in terms of quality and personality.

None of his new acquisitions had arrived or were match-ready, but the departing crew signed off well.

 

Andy has enticed a number of players without contracts, mostly veterans on a final year before retirement – yes, the very type he was getting rid of. Partly this was due to higher quality, but partly because before taking steps forward, Andy knew he had to step back.  Loch Ness was a massive, long term project. Underpinning it was a youth policy that required advanced infrastructure, which would take years to build. So in the short-term, the onus was on survival, and that meant getting results in the present.

The board's vision

One reason Loch Ness FC folded last year before the restructuring reprieve was that they didn't have their own home. They are still ground-sharing with Fortrose, but the board have intentions to build a new stadium. Any has no idea what kind of timescale it has in mind, and expects there will be no further upgrades to the training facilities in the meantime.

 

He has an enormous staff to support him

Just about everyone is vastly more experienced than Andy. No pressure there, then!

This is him being very busy

Many of the incoming players (and staff) are from around the Highlands. Loch Ness has benefitted from Ross County and Inverness Caley being knocked down a few pegs. Some of the new staff had very secure jobs with big clubs before jobs were shed in the shake-up.

Edited Saturday at 07:14 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

The following weekend, the league season began - away at Derby County!

This division is very much a league of two halves -

Andy reckons he can get the Monsters further up the table than the bookies reckon - above Shetland, anyway.

 

Andy's calling this a win -a moral victory. It was utterly one-sided on grass, but the scoreline was better than anyone had anticipated. This was with the new guys who had arrived, with square pegs filling round holes where players were still awaited. To compare, look at the results elsewhere!

When the new squad is complete, we'll take a look at them, before Dany starts her season.

[phnompenhandy]

It's been a difficult start to the season for Andy, yet he doesn't feel concerned

He's disappointed with the performance against local rivals Brora Rangers, but all three league matches have been single-goal defeats to vastly superior opposition. He still believes the monsters have the beating of five or six opponents, particularly when the players have gelled and understand the tactical instructions. It'll come.

[phnompenhandy]

Dany – in contrast to Andy, is a one-woman show; she has few and limited staff and a tiny pool of players to recruit from, but given her personal talents, she expects to win the title with the squad she’s adapted.

Seven players disapproved of a young female manger and left – she has a full squad of 19 to play 24 matches. She may have to scout outside the island – which is a problem with it being remote from other islands or the mainland. Maybe other players will see how her side sweeps all before them and come over.

[4th wall breaker - her squad appears to be bigger than any other team's - there can't be 100 players in the database)

 

The first match was a comfortable 3-0 win without the players even breaking sweat

dany's devised a tactic that takes into account the amateur nature of the players. It's a very low energy approach, which should remain appropriate since there are no non-island opponents to play.

She still retches at the sight of the, er, chocolate-coloured shirts! 

Edited Saturday at 09:41 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

Here is a sample of Dany's squad. This is the level of the poorest footballing nation in the world. You can compare with the equivalents in Andy's squad below.

Goalkeeper

Defender

Midfielder

Winger

Striker

[phnompenhandy]

Andy thinks his squad is pretty much assembled and just needs bedding in. The focus is now on offloading the old squad.

Goalkeeper

Defender

Midfielder

Winger

Striker

[phnompenhandy]

The direction Loch Ness is travelling is clear to see:

The squad Andy inherited was not fit for the purpose - everyone knew that. He had money for transfers and wages, and a long window ahead of him. He had a formidable team of scouts too. Here's another look at his first team staff:

Yet for all that support, doing his coaching badges didn't prepare him for wheeling and dealing, and he found the purchasing of players onerous and too slow for his liking. Nevertheless, he was good at hit and significantly strengthened the squad, bit by bit.

Even with an inferior squad, despite August bringing zero points, the defeats were all narrow, indicating his cautious, batten-down-the-hatches approach was the correct approach.

The first point eventually arrived - amidst much dismay.

Lochbroom are one of only a couple of teams with a lower reputation than ours and were targeted as an opponent to extract six points from. However, the results  that followed were impressive and the only reverse was affected by having to rest some key players.

Andy feels that slowly but surely, Loch Ness is coming closer to winning league games. As he recruits better additions one by one, the side is outclassed in every match, but they defend grimly and well. This perception of Andy’s was firmly agreed by all when the Monsters and a sizeable travelling support made the short trip north to Dingwall to face the biggest team in the highlands, the mighty Staggies of Ross County, and came away with another draw. The schedule is distorted anyway, pitting the club against all the strongest opponents first. Wins will start accumulating come November. Keep the faith.

Dany's experience could not be more different. With six wins in six games, she's heading toward an invincible season. Thee's no drama or jeopardy. She doesn't need staff or money, or even scouting chops. With all players in the nation being amateur, they simply hop on and off the league merry-go-round. Her full squad had dropped to 17, but with matches spread a week apart and the intensity low, injuries are rare. There's simply nothing to report. She'll probably get you up to date when (not if) she secures the title and her first trophy and sets her attention to her second and presumably more challenging job.

[phnompenhandy]

Fans can be so dumb and impatient sometimes -

 

People, look at how the fixtures fall:

Loch Ness has a good chance of winning five of the next eight. Andy's held a team meeting to get the message across to the players.

Fans should understand that this whole 'inverting the pyramid' is an extreme restructuring, and Andy needs a season to consolidate a club that had just gone extinct in the old regime. The inversion does bring benefits - money and higher quality players. Loch Ness has just pulled off a huge coup - securing an Arsenal Under-17s goalkeeper on a season loan (the 'big clubs' are engaging n cost-cutting exercises, and the 'little clubs' have gained financially):

  Wonderkid klaxon!  He even gets his own background!

However, get real - Loch Ness are not going to compete with Ipswich Town and the ex-Championship sides, which dominate the top of the league. It will take many years for the pyramid to settle. Eight sides that get relegated from Tier 6 will be beatable by Loch Ness, two of which will fall into the Coffee Division. Two teams will get promoted, leaving behind six ex-Championship and three ex-SPL sides to go again. Andy will narrow the gap year-on-year, but don't expect promotion any time soon. The same applies throughout the inverted pyramid. Twenty Premier League clubs were demoted to other Tier 7 divisions; only four can get out in anyone season.

Conversely, at the other end, two points currently separate the top seven teams in the new Premier League. Proper old skool!

Edited Sunday at 15:19 by phnompenhandy

[shd34_216_42]

My favorite part of the inverted pyramid is the enormous disparity in attendance. The concept of all these big teams going to a 500-seater for a league game is hilarious.

What's the actual stadium requirements, out of curiosity?

[phnompenhandy]

4 minutes ago, shd34_216_42 said:

My favorite part of the inverted pyramid is the enormous disparity in attendance. The concept of all these big teams going to a 500-seater for a league game is hilarious.

What's the actual stadium requirements, out of curiosity?

Thanks for commenting. Yes, half my home games have been stadium sell-outs. The capacity is 500.

In the same division, the likes of Derby and Ipswich only fill 80% of theirs, albeit we're talking attendances of 25-30K. In another seventh tier division, 72K still rock up to Old Trafford each week.

Way up in the Premier League, Barrow has the biggest attendances, with over 6000 regularly watching, with Kirkwall Thorfinn (which was somehow in the first round of the European Conference League) averaging 181.

[shd34_216_42]

Not realistic, but hilarious that Old Trafford is still almost selling out. (Would be less funny if the fans were still paying Premier League ticket prices.)

[phnompenhandy]

3 hours ago, shd34_216_42 said:

Not realistic, but hilarious that Old Trafford is still almost selling out. (Would be less funny if the fans were still paying Premier League ticket prices.)

You got me checking this.

Ex-Premier League team tick et prices appear to max out at £20, with Man City charging a mere £3. They must still get a ton of money from broadcasting ans sponsorship to not need gate money. They haven't shorn their expensive squad members like I'd expected. In my holiday test they were immediately offloading loads to Saudi but now I've nerfed that, they're staying.

New Premier League teams all charge c£20

In Loch Ness's league the top teams (Ipswich, Derby) charge £20. It costs £5 to watch Loch Ness.

None of this is realistic of course; it's an entertaining fantasy as you say. Having looked more deeply, the creator has given silly money to 90% of teams in the pyramid which spoils it a bit for me but it does equalise matters.

[phnompenhandy]

Beating Galway 2-1 at the end of November was the first indication that Andy’s charges were gelling and ready to take on the middle-ranking sides in the league. The following narrow loss to Ipswich seemed to confirm the progress. He insisted it would be the second half of the season where fans would start to see the foundations their manager had laid.

Andy won four and drew one of the five games he’d projected to win, going on to lose to teams Loch Ness really should be losing to and beating the weakest. One exception was a terrific victory over ex-SPL Kilmarnock, and the 6-0 thrashing of Dungannon Swifts drew admiration.

Andy’s been targeting younger players, bringing the average age of the squad down to 24, with none in their 30s. The intention is for this core to stick together and get the club out of the seventh tier. Andy reckons they will have the quality to make a challenge with a bit more experience and development.

Loch Ness has clearly progressed to the middle band of teams in this league.

Dany sunk into boredom and complacency, losing two matches to ruin her aim at an invincible first season, but she's still on course for the title.

Edited Monday at 10:34 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

Remember Dany - with her Moai?

Secured title and stayed to receive trophy.

This is her squad at the end of the season - as you can see, there was very little rotation

She brought her time to a close

[phnompenhandy]

So now she's unemployed and seeking another job, a step up, according to her career plan. The problem is, she discovered after applying for posts in Liechtenstein, Guadeloupe and Martinique, is that no one outside Oceania has followed her success, and even within Oceania, no FIFA-registered nation gives her a mind. Thus it was that she didn't receive a single response. It was also problematic that the season ended in Rapa Nui in a different season to everywhere else.

Slim pickings:

(she can only apply for half-star posts from FIFA-unregistered nations for now)

You might have spotted one opening

It's almost the end of the season in Tuvalu, where Nauti has won the league and is sweeping all the domestic trophies. A frustrated Vaoloa board has sacked their manager - naturally, Dany applied. She's heard nothing for almost a month - it turns out a caretaker was appointed until the end of the season, where two cup finals were still due.

Leagues in Oceania ranked by lowest reputation

You might have noticed that the Tuvalu league is of a lower reputation than Rapa Nui, but going backwards to move forwards seems the only route for her, given the lack of options.

Dany will get going eventually - she just needs a break, to get noticed.

So, it's farewell to Rapa Nui

 

Edited Monday at 16:13 by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

Andy has also made it to the end of his first season - or has he?

He was delighted with Loch Ness' strong finish in the league

A couple of coups there brought about a very respectable final placing

Ipswich and Preston will be replaced by two clubs at our level or below, leaving us with perhaps five sides that ought to be much stronger. It's not unfeasible that promotion is two years' away.

Just as he was preparing to get away for a summer break, this news dropped -

A summer tourny played before preseason commences. A knock-out competition with a potential five ties if Loch Ness make it to the final, and the board are expecting Andy to take it seriously. The players will be grumpy and unfit, so Andy has no idea how it will go.

[phnompenhandy]

For those curious about the inverted pyramid, here are some other tables -

also in tier seven

The likes of Man City, Chelsea and Liverpool are stranded for another season, meanwhile at the other end:

It seems only Irish outfit Tolka Rovers qualify for the Champions League, with the likes of Llantwit Major going into the Europa League. I'll keep an eyeon that.

Sleat & Strath, Gairloch and Plockton can probably expect annual humiliations and relegations until they hit rock bottom in six years.

Stevenage Borough, Crewe Alexandra and maybe Abergavenny should be favourites for the title next season.

How many years will it take for the system to stabilise and revert to the status quo? Theoretically, it would take the worst ex-Premier League club 16 years to get back to the top tier.

[phnompenhandy]

Close season activity

Dany bided her time, sending off applications and receiving nothing in response for over two months. Suddenly at the beginning of July the job market sprang to life – clubs from French Guiana, Zanzibar, Liechtenstein, and seemingly every club in San Marino had a vacancy. Vaoloa never did reply to her app, but the Tuvaluan new season would not start until January, and she understood thee inability to plan ahead.

Altogether, eight managers left their posts in San Marino including Tre Penne. Dany applied to five.  Three of them invited her to interview, the requests all coming by email within an hour.

She agreed to attend the Tre Penne interview first, at which the other two got the hump. The interview went well and she assured the chairman that she wouldn’t consider any other jobs until she heard back. While waiting, two invitations from Guadeloupe were received – could she sneak away with the knowledge being leaked? She decided not to and wait on Tre Penne.

What she learned was that club culture focuses on youth development, but can bring in some Under 23 players for the first team. She wasn't asked about this, but it's an area in which she has no experience. This would not be a one-year in-out, wham-bam-trophy-done job. Although it could be - Tre Penne are expected to challenge for the league; the season starts in a few days and they have a two-legged tie in the Europa Conference 1^st round v Olympiakos. Would she be in charge for that?

Edited 21 hours ago by phnompenhandy

[phnompenhandy]

Andy was busy in the transfer market, replacing players he reluctantly had to let go. Two left on minimum-release clauses and the on-loan goalkeeper from Arsenal returned to his parent club. Two of his key coaching staff were poached, and three other backroom staff retired, butt he board wouldn't allow any to be replaced.

Was the board in financial straits? Andy was confused.

 

Yet a month later, after his umpteenth board request was rejected, he finally got his way -

So the club has gone backwards to stand still. Meanwhile,  other lcubs are very active:

League champions Tolka Rovers filled thaat managerial post with .... Arsene Wenger.

These 'little' clubs are doing bits - if Loch Ness' board fails to show the ambition they purport, the club will never achieve its ambitions.

Just to rub salt in, the FA stiffed the club with the turn to the new season:

 

The eight relegated sides from tier six went into the three other tier seven leagues. The Coffee League got a redistributed Wolves and Sunderland. Any dreams of challenging for promotion are dashed, so it's clear in Andy's mind that he must aim for consolidation – maintaining the level of the first team while recruiting high-potential youngsters for the Under-18 squad.

[phnompenhandy]

Well, this is unexpected. After an utterly uneventful first season, claiming a first trophy that nobody noticed nor cared about, Dany has secured a very exciting post.

She got the Tre Penne gig.

She nudged the salary up to £1,800 per month, sorely needed for accommodation. A European job was not on her radar - she'd anticipated taking five years to get there. To be fair, as wikipedia states,

"As of 18 August 2024, the FIFA committee recognizes San Marino as the lowest-ranking team according to the FIFA World Rankings." It is currently 209th.

There are 15 football clubs registered in the nation; somehow the league Dany is managing in has 16 as of July 2024.

San Marino has a population of 35 thousand, so there is a very small pool to draw youth from. She quickly assessed the youth squad and with the exception of one brilliant striker who goes straight into the first team squad, the resst are a write-off.

So here she is; ready the 'brows:

A bit of background about the "Three Feathers",

In 2013, it became the first Sammarinese team to ever win a match in European competition. They’ve not repeated the feat as yet.

It's a huge step up from Rapa Nui, that's for sure

A few players had left over the summer, and she knew she couldn't rely on the kids, as mentioned, so she took her first ever transfer kitty and dived right in. She re-signed a young defender from Udinese on a second loan, and one player just released by the club a week before she joined. Checking free players, she found a goalkeeper, and then spent the whole transfer budget on five players, all of whom are Sammarinese under 23s. The media are impressed and tip Tre Penne to claim the title. This is going to be a ride. Get on.

 

Edited 21 hours ago by phnompenhandy

[oche balboa]

Again i love you ideas. Interested in the Liechtenstein League, Did you make it yourself or was it a download? 

[phnompenhandy]

6 minutes ago, oche balboa said:

Again i love you ideas. Interested in the Liechtenstein League, Did you make it yourself or was it a download? 

That was a hard one to crack. I used a file by @falsobohemio but getting it active is tricky due to overlapping with Switzerland.

[phnompenhandy]

ANDY

The season’s first competitive games were in the Highlands & Islands Cup – the first being a little east coast rivalry with neighbours Premier League Dornoch City. The two met in the same competition a year ago, and just like that game, The Monsters ran out comfortable winners, 3-1 this time, such is the zany nature of cup competitions in this new world order of the inverted pyramid. They repeated the wheeze in the next round, knocking out another Premier side in Kirkwall Thorfinn.  The matches also indicated that not all Premier League sides were doing magic in the market.

Andy always uses the friendlies to focus on blending in new players, building fitness and tactical familiarity. The cup ties are against inferior (Premier League!) opposition, so there's not much in the way of clues to suggest how Loch Ness will fare against the top-half teams in their league.

East Kilbride bid £1.2 million for Joe Rose, the goalkeeper who played 16 games last season (with the on-loan keeper playing the rest). He was due to be the first-choice keeper but a bid like that couldn’t be turned down, so Andy’s on the look-out for a replacement. The keeper released by Dunfermline that Andy picked up seems fine and will step up, but Andy soon found a free agent in a goalkeeper who was last on the books of MK Dons when they went bust a year ago. He had retired, but at age 31 is happy to be a backup at Loch Ness for a year.

This is Andy's full squad going into the season

Here are three outstanding teenagers, two being twin brothers -