Sublime Shoreham FM24

[TheNayr]

Shoreham. Who the Hell are they?!

 

 

One last foray into FM24 before FM25 comes out and all going well. This will hopefully last me into the new game and beyond, that's the vision anyway!

 

So, Shoreham FC. My first actual team that I coached with. Starting with U7s for a few months then dropped down to U6s. Here were my coaching shirt and hoody.

 

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So I have a bit of a connection to this team! 

The club is located in Shoreham-By-Sea which is right on the English coast. You wouldn't have guessed by the name!!! Their nickname is The Musselmen as back in the day, picking mussels is what the town was known for. Here it is on a map.

About 15 minutes from Brighton down their on the coast. A census from 2021 puts it about 23.6k people living there, so we'll say over 3 years later, could be around 25k now.

Shoreham play at Middle Road which has a capacity of 2,000. The file I'm using had it at 1,500 people could fit in there, so I went into the editor and changed that little detail, the only change I made.

I have met the Chairman Stuart Slaney a few times, nice guy! We are starting in the Sussex County Football League which is all the way in the 9th tier. We have a long way to climb. It will be a tough challenge.

As you can see from that image above, we're starting with bloody awful facilities, the worst of the worst. The pre-game editor had everything listed as 0 haha! Due to that, it rules out a youth academy challenge which I do plan on doing for my first FM25 save when I get around to it eventually.

This is how our supporters are at the club.

We are in 5 tournaments this year, though I don't care about the bottom two. Being this low down, the FA Cup is the most important for the money it can bring in.

Speaking of money, here's how the finances look.

We're expected to end the season around -£28k, though hopefully with a little FA Cup and maybe FA Vase run, we can make that a little better by the end of the year.

Here is the table with every other team we'll be playing, the main goal is to avoid a relegation battle, the media currently has us finishing in 16th.

This is how I'm starting. Sunday league football reputation and National B licence as I'm an FA Level Two coach for real. 

I won't show the squad this time as I'm going to have to do my best Harry Redknapp impression to get some new players in as I don't have much help.

The staff room is a little small, though I only need to bring in a couple of faces.

Let's rise with Shoreham and do some damage.

 

Until next time.

[TheNayr]

Because of how low down the pyramid that we're starting, I thought instead of just manually looking for staff, I'd put out job adverts to attract new members of staff that way.

That has been done also to our HOYD, scout and Head Physio so our backroom has been filled out to what I want. Though they are all pretty poor if I'm being honest, however, it's to be expected! I also did this for bringing players in. Only going off of player recommendations from my staff, agents or players themselves. I've had close to 70 odd players on trial I'd say.

Let's look into the team now then! I have made 10 signings since taking over. 3 loans and the rest being free agents,

The 16 year old kid was the only GK at the entire club, so obviously I had to address that, though it took some time to actually get a guy in and it turns out, he's not too shabby!

Obviously at this level, none of these players are going to be good, but that's the standard we find ourselves at! Gregor Shaw is tall with decent reflexes and agility. I will take that.

All four of our starting defenders are new signings as you'll find for most of the starting 11 haha!

Matty Holness was a loan option suggested by my HOYD and I used it, especially as Dover Athletic didn't want any wages for him, always a bonus for us.

Not much to say about him, decent physically I guess. That's something,

Our first CB is Reece Irwin. He started his career at Northampton.

He's strong, aggressive and brave. What more do you want from a centre back?!

His partner is Dominic Ogun. We are his tenth club.

For this level, his physicals are very welcome, even if there isn't much else.

The last new piece of this backline is ex Cardiff graduate Josh Pike.

Phyiscals. That's all that matters.

I am running a custom made 4-3-3 with 1 DM and 2 CMs. 2 of them are part of the 10 new players.

The player who was already here is Ross Myers though he's only playing because recently Aaron King (Who was a new signing) has been struck down for 4-7 months. In the screenshot he has a bid on him by a few teams, I have offered a new deal and hopefully he'll be staying.

I'd rather not be starting him, but he's all I've got. Maybe I'll look to bring someone else in. I've just offered about 5 CMs a two week trial.

The guy opposite him in centre midfield started at my team, Crawley Town. Curtis Gayler. I must add, I didn't bring him in but he's pretty good!

He's very well rounded and will be an important player this year.

The guy sitting behind them at DM is Jamie Andrews. I'll just say, I want to upgrade him even though I've only just signed him! He doesn't look good, but he'll do for the time being.

The attacking unit is a weak unit and I have a few players about to come and trial for us.

With only striker in my formation, that falls to 16 year old Renny Beavon, I've trialed a few players and they either didn't want to join or wanted more than £20 a week, my maximum. 

Some really good finishing and work rate here. The excellent determination is nice but ultimately means nothing due to our awful facilities.

All the new signings sky rocketed us up from a media prediction of 16th up to 6th which is good news for our chances of going up first time round. One downside of all these signings is the finances, we've gone from a projected end of season figure of -£28k to now -£37k. It doesn't sound too much, but at this level. It's a bit of a killer. We do need a good FA Cup run this season.

Oh....well that's no good. 

Has the league gone any better?! 

WELL THAT'S MORE LIKE IT! 6 games, 6 wins and only 2 goals conceded. What an absolutely belting start to the league!!!

Winning the league first year in charge?!

 

Until next time.

 

 

 

 

 

[TheNayr]

Well I definitely angered the FM Gods with my flippant comment about winning the league in the first year because the very next game after the last update went like this:

Was this the start of the slide? Am I talking to you now outside of the playoff zone losing 7 of my last 8?!

 

 

 

 

 

Nah of course not, we're still smashing it! We are massively overperforming and long may it continue. These positive results have obviously kept us doing well in the table, leaving us looking like this.

A big 10 point gap to the 6th place team keeping us well in the hunt for promotion, though there's plenty of time to go!

After crashing out of the FA Cup qualifying rounds very early, the next big tournament for us was the FA Vase. Whilst the money was no-where near what the FA Cup can offer, a few wins can wrack up a few thousand pounds which is vital for us!

Hmm, you'd look at that and think that's an okay run for a 9th tier team right? Wrong. Look at this disgusting game against Crook Town.

Yeah, you're reading it right. By the 32nd minute they were down to 9 men and we couldn't break them down. It took us until the 74th minute to score a goal which really annoyed me. How did it take so long to break them down with a 2 man advantage?! I was very mad when they equalised that late, how the F did we let that happen?! Then to lose on penalties?! Horrendous result. If I was actually managing, them 11 players would be doing a Bleep Test until they were all sick.

I have been unable to add a new CM and a new striker despite trialing and offering deals to many players.

 

Until next time.