erik45

February 2044. Another month with the feeling of "almost". Most of the month we played really well, but the loss against Chester really hurt. We didn't deserve, but it happened. Table. Positives: we are with 99 % certainty in the playoffs. Negatives: teams in positions 4 & 5 are getting too close! Transfer. Another signing, whaaaat?! Wellens had been without a club for over six months. I had tried to sign him earlier, but he wasn't interested. Now he was and although he was asking high wages, I decided to take the risk and sign him. The reason: we don't have proper advanced forwards. He is not perfect, but should be a better option than the current ones. Injury. Our best target man has been missing almost all the games this month, not good. Upcoming fixtures. We need to keep on winning points, I'm desperate to get the 3rd place as it gives us a pass from the 1st playoff round.

January 2044. The new year brought less losses, more draws, I'm quite okay with that. The results were quite fair until the Grimsby game. We created chance after chance but they just didn't budge. Table. Looks like the top 2 is starting to get too far away from us. Corinthian-Casuals are just flying right now and Bath City are almost as good as them. I put this here because we have three players on this list, but only one of them is a goalkeeper! Already twice this season we have been in a situation where our goalie has got injured in the game. As I never have a keeper on the bench, the outfield players have been put there to protect our goal. So far it has been very successful tactic, they are yet to concede a goal! Upcoming fixtures. I don't care about the FA Trophy (maybe I will if we get through ), but I will still keep my rhythm of using 1st XI for the weekends and the 2nd XI for the midweek games.

December 2043. The end of the year was a real rollercoaster. Loss, win, loss, win, loss.... I think we were creating enough to win almost any game (Bath City game being the exception, they deserved the win). I could've been happy with the month if we had won against Morecambe. They are in the playoff spots with us and we played them out of the park, but scored only once from ~3 xG while they scored thrice with less than 1 xG. How is that possible? I tell you how: we lost our best-performing keeper for two months. Montgomery 39c doesn't have the best attributes, but he is performing so much better than "number 1" Leigh 34c. Just look at Leigh 34c's form: In the attack we are firing all cylinders! This screenshot is from early December, but it would look exactly the same at the turn of the year. Table. Not the best of month, we dropped to third and even with all the draws, Corinthian-Casuals are 10 points above us. On the positive note, we also have a ten point gap to teams outside of playoff places. xPts. The top 3 or 5 is above everyone else. Corinthian-Casuals are way above other top sides when it comes to overperforming their xPts. New assistant manager. I hadn't renewed my assistant's contract so he was here on a month-to-month basis. I missed that Fleetwood Town had offered him manager position - which he accepted. When looking for a new one I wanted one with a very good personality and good enough stats. Finances. The cup run ended this month, but we gained about €0,5m from it, very good! Wages. This is bit of a concern IF we don't get promoted this season. From ~€9k to ~€14k in a year or so, that's over 50 % rise in wage expenses. Upcoming fixtures. Apparently I forgot to take the screenshot at the beginning of month, so here's one with two games played. The win one, lose one rhythm seems to continue...

Youth intake preview. A-rated striker, there we land! I really hope that guy is capable of playing advanced forward, because we are in a dire need of a player in that position. It's also a 5-star intake, no complaints about that.

November 2043. A great start to the month, but then we maybe lost some of the great momentum we had. We definitely should've won against the league leaders Corinthian-Casuals, but they somehow find a way to win almost any game. The draw in the cup against Mansfield is a great result, but it also means one more game to the already hectic winter. Table. We are 2nd, very good! There's quite a gap between us and the leaders, only if we had won the game against them... Finances. Cup game = profit at the end of the month. International call-ups. I'm very happy to see players getting called up! The most excited I'm about GK Macready 41e getting his first call-up to England U20s! Upcoming fixtures. FA Cup replay, FA Trophy start and five games in the league. We will most definitely need all our 1st team players to show what they're capable of. If at the end of the month we are still 2nd and are through in the FA Cup, I will be very satisfied!

October 2043. What a month! Only blip was the late conceded goal against Woking to lose a tight game. The highlight of the month was the Halloween game against Marine, who lead the League 1. They had no chance against us! Table. Some lost points at the end of the month, but we are still doing very well! Also, Corinthian-Casuals have finally started to drop points. Finances. Three cup games = money! Expenditure of €317k is also a lot! Upcoming fixtures. Can we keep the momentum in the league, while making it to the 3rd round in the FA Cup? It doesn't show here, but the opponent is Mansfield, who are a mid-table side in the League 1.

September 2043. Okayyyy, now we're talking! We were very close to a perfect month as we were leading Radcliffe 2-0, but 13 points out of possible 15 is still very, very good. Table. We go all the way to the 2nd place, only behind the undefeated Corinthian-Casuals. Injury. Notice where he got injured. He got injured in the first half against Stockport and we didn't have a keeper on the bench (we never do), but our defender in goal kept a clean sheet. Finances. After couple of months of losing money, we are back on track of making profit! Upcoming fixtures. FA Cup starts and we didn't get the kindest of draws as we travel to Halifax who are in the same league as we. They are 22nd in the league at the moment, so we should be slight favourites for the game.

August 2043. This would've been a very good start if we've had kept the leads against Gillingham and Morecambe. But we did not so this is bit meh. Table. A slow start, but not a catastrophic one. Corinthian-Casuals are starting very strongly! Transfer in. We welcome Mendes to the team on loan from Carlisle United. He's Montserratian, and together with Roach they are the midfield duo of the Monsterrat national team. I hope their partnership is good as I plan to slowly push Mendes to the 1st XI. We even pay a small loan fee to get him. Mendes has plenty of experience for a 21 year old as he 60+ games in L2 and 33 games for his national team. I also tried to get some strikers and a left back to join us, but none of them were interested. The left back I had been trying to get didn't want to join us, but was okay going on loan to a division below us?! New contract. My contract was up at the end of the season and as I asked for a new one I was positively surprised they offered me 3 year contract. I added +1 if promoted, I'm very happy with this. Finances. This is quite a bit of loss for August. Usually we do €0-20k loss in the first month of the season, €90k is a lot... do I need to get worried? I say no, not yet. Upcoming fixtures. First mid-week game and first TV game of the season. No easy opponents, let's see if we can properly get this season going on in September!

Season 2043/2044 preview. It is the "20th anniversary" of this save! This is the 20th season, 4th in the Vanarama National League - and I think it can be the last! Board Expectations. The board ain't so positive. The previous board wanted mid-table finish, but the new board is satisfied if we just fight against relegation. We are much, much better than that. Anything but a place in the playoffs would be a disappointment for me. Media predictions. We are the 13th best team in the league according to media, and I kind of agree. Other teams have better players, but we have players who have played together for a long time and have a strong commitment between them and the club. I would say top 3 is the ambitious target, but I would be content with a place in the playoffs. I somewhat agree with our key player McGeechan 39e, he had a "good enough" season. I also agree Wakeham 42a is our best talent, but the problem is he is very unambitious (I know that because mentoring report has told multiple times him being more ambitious than before but he is still unambitious), so he hasn't developed almost at all. 1st XI. One of our older players, Haddow 35f, gets the vacated LB spot. Why? Because we don't have any proper talents for the position. The only other change is that I have put Wakeham 42a as our starting DLP. He had that position once before, but couldn't hold to it. He is now a bit older (still only 17), maybe he can find his form this time? 2nd XI. This XI changes multiple times during the pre-season as players get loaned out. The team leaders Dugdale 31c and Mayman 28c are there to help the youngsters to develop themselves and help the team to win games. Most excited I'm about 1) Chapman 42g who assisted a lot of goals for the U18s last season and 2) Affleck 42d who scored 47 goals and assisted 14 more last season. This season is a test if he could be advanced forward even though his best position might be presssing forward or shadow striker. Finances. We've made a loss of €250k during the pre-season, that's quite a lot, isn't it? There's mysterious €123k expenditure in the category of Other, I have no idea what that is. Transfers. A silent summer, I like it! Manager. I look at this screen once a year, at the beginning of season. During the last year, I have improved attributes in Attacking, Youngster knowledge and Determination. I really that the determination stat is going up. My personality has been fairly loyal for a long time, maybe it could change in the near future to a better one? Pre-season friendlies. Many tough games and I'm happy with everything...if we don't look at the very last game, where the 2nd XI lost to Barrow, who are in the division below us. Upcoming fixtures. The season starts at Gillingham who were promoted after a season in the National South. We've faced them 4 times and won 4, but they are not to be underestimated as they are higher in the media predictions than us.

@shd34_216_42, talking about Corinthian-Casuals having good players, this just came: Sheehan is 24, from Tottenham's academy, and has played for Barnsley and Crystal Palace. Xiaolong is only 24 but has almost 100 games in the Championship & League One (and one in the Premier League ). Cheshire has 6 games in the Premier League, a full season in League 2 when he was 19 and is now 26. And I think this is really cool (but maybe a bit unrealistic such promising players turning fully amateur so early in their careers).

Final league table. Last season we were one win away from promotion, but after we lost three of our best players I knew this season is going to be difficult. If we would've been a bit more consistent I would have been very happy with this season (even without promotion). Next season is going to be a big one! I may need to fight harder to keep the best players, but I have had this rule that I don't keep players who want (and deserve) to move to a better division, if we are offered a fair compensation. xG table. The xGA and the xPts...not looking good. Last season we were the best team in xPts, this time the fifth. Last season we outperformed the stat by a little bit, this time we underperformed. Next season we get extremely efficient, yes?? PL table. I needed to show this: no teams from Liverpool in Premier League 2043/2044. Everton is now a mid-table team in Championship, even had a season in L1 and Liverpool has had financial troubles. I love it when big teams get relegated, I don't know why. Best XI. It is our 1st XI. We will lose Bremser 36c as he didn't want to renew his contract. His new team will be Paderborn in 3. Liga. I really hope he will be the only loss from this bunch. Players by played minutes. As we didn't have massive cup run(s), the difference between minutes played by the 1st XI and the 2nd is quite clear. Players by average rating. Chapman 42g, what a player! He might get his chance in the 2nd XI next season. And once again, the target forwards got the best ratings, I really like to know how that happens _every_ season. Players by goals. Positives: five players with 10+ goals. Negatives: no players with 15+ goals. We need a deadly striker, but I don't think we have that kind of player in our books. There are couple of interesting forwards available on loan who are from the British Overseas Territories, maybe we can get one of them to join us? Players by assists. Montserratian Roach had a nice debut season. He started slowly but in the end he was one of the more consistent players. He's also the only player who's not from our academy. International call-ups. First time our player has been called up for an international tournament as Opoku 41d joins Ghana U20s for Toulon Tournament! Also, do we have an uncut gem in our hand: Wood 43c has been called up to Scotland U20s while being 15 years old! His personality sucks, but he is in a mentoring group so I hope we will make him more ambitious and determined (and professional etc.) Club improvement. This was a real surprise. Just few weeks before the board election the current board decided to suggest youth level improvement. I was so happy to agree as they have declined the improvement multiple times. Now we move to Level 2! The costs of the youth setup goes up, from ~€80k to €95k, but this shouldn't be a major problem. In the election the club got a new chairman and his board decided to add a new objective for me: Maintain the Vanarama League's best youth system. Does the maintaining part of the objective imply we already have the best system? Nice! Transfers. I'm happy that it was so quiet in the transfer front. Dozens of loans, but that's just how it goes. I would have preferred not to lose Arnison 41a but Bristol offered good money and even if his attributes were pretty good for a young player, he just didn't live up to the level expected from him. Sell-on fee. Burdett 37d moved to Port Vale in the beginning of season for €1k. To get €33k more from him is a nice bonus. He wasn't developing or playing too much so I decided to cash in now. Finances. The cup games helped us back to a healthy bank balance after we had training AND youth facility upgrades. I think the next step is to gather more money so we can turn pro.

April. Maybe even the best month of the season. until the end, but our 2nd XI couldn't find a way to challenge Newport. Table. Even with three wins we wouldn't have made it to playoffs as Forest Green Rovers were too strong. The Chester win was nice as without it we would have been 10th. Goalkeepers' stats. This can't be possible. These are screenshots from both of our GKs stats. Maybe I don't understand the stat of expected goals prevented. But I read this as they face X amount of xGOT and on average concede one more goal per match from those chances than they statistically should..? "Nice"!

Of course, I also do have a soft spot for them! One thing about them that irritates me is the fact they have so many players with proper experience in the PL/CH level. But maybe they are such a cool club players want to join them when they start to wind down their careers.

March 2043. Two losses to start the month, not the way to show we belong to the playoffs. Then a friendly and two hard fought wins. We just aren't taking our chances right now and the opponents are. Table. We still have a small chance of taking the last playoff spot! International call-up. I show these every time there's a new player getting called up (or a player getting senior call-up for the first time). This time the new guy is Opoku 41d, who's only 17, but made it to Ghana U20 team. He hasn't been amazing, but he is fairly consistent, and that's more than I can ask for a player that young. Upcoming fixtures. Three games, all difficult in their own way. We need to win all three to even have a chance of making it to the playoffs. It wouldn't be the end of the world to not get there, but it would still be a chance of getting promoted!

Youth intake 2043. Three elite talents, two of them being interesting CB + CM combination! I see a lot of wingers, which we don't use in our system, but at least some of them can play in other positions as well. This bunch of players looks somewhat balanced, almost boring..? Not too many very good or very bad personalities, no real standout talents, but many interesting players (my top 5 player profiles below). I really like the dual nationalities, especially the CYP/ENG & USA/ENG. We are in a dire need of a proper advanced forward, but this intake didn't bring it. But we did get two prospects who can play DLP (McGivern 43b & Wood 43c) , a position we've been a bit short for a long, long time.

February 2043. I was feeling so good after the amazing 6-0 win and well fought 3 points against Stockport that the back to back losses hurt so bad. Wigan played really well against us, but I don't know how we lost to United of Manchester... Table. Six points from four games is not the best, but we still have a real chance for the last playoff spot! Player of the Month. This was well deserved! Joyce 37f is playing his first full season with us - and he's already 21! He wasn't a sure starter for the 1st XI in the first half of the season, but he has developed really nicely - and become quite effective! Upcoming fixtures. Weird rhythm in the schedule, but we don't care. We desperately need at least three wins to keep our promotion battle alive. The first two games will be crucial, as those are against sides above us.

January 2043. Not the best of starts for a new year. We definitely should've won our first two league games, but it is the same story: we can't hold on to our lead. The FA Trophy game was just bizarre. We created 3,3 xG but just couldn't score (they also created over 2,0 xG). But the month ended in good form as we took two wins and had only a narrow loss against league leaders (playing our 2nd XI). Table. Places 1.-5. are already gone, but if we find a more consistent form, we could still get a playoff place. The end of the month gives me hope that our players have that form in them. Transfer. I don't know if it is wise to sell players so young, but when they insist, there's not much I can do if I don't want to leave them unhappy. Maybe I should ignore their feelings for a while, because we keep on losing our best and most promising players too soon. Arnison 41a should be one of our best players, but I just feel he doesn't contribute that much. Yes, he's only 17 years old and already having 7,0+ avg rating, but still, something isn't clicking. So when he demanded a transfer and Bristol City offered a good package, I decided to accept it. Finances. The transfer fee gives a little boost to our finances. Extended leave...or not? This was a weird situation. My assistant suggested that Gilroy 38a needs some rest. I accepted physios recommendation, 1-2 weeks of holiday. BUT he sent him on leave for three weeks?! But that's not the weird part. During his leave, Colchester asked to have him on trial for a week. I accepted it just to see what happens. He went there, had his trial and then came back to team without continuing the leave! And he wasn't feeling jaded anymore?! He came back almost a week earlier than planned, which was good for me, because he had such a long leave by accident. Upcoming fixtures. A quieter month, (I just don't get how the schedules are made, as Dec-Jan is pure madness). We need wins and we need them consistently.

December 2042. Chaotic month with mixed results. Two wins with five goals scored, but the rest of it wasn't that good. It seems we just can't hold the lead. Against Halifax we were leading 3-1 until the 88th minute, against Barnet we started with two goals and they answered with three...luckily we scored once in the end to get one point. Table. Still in the last playoff position. Positives: 6th place isn't that far away. Negatives: we've played 1-4(!) games more than the rest. xPts table. I've said it before: if we want to get promoted, we need to outperform our xPts. Upcoming fixtures. FA Trophy is not important for us, the focus is 100 % league.

Youth intake preview. Two promising centre backs, let's gooo!!! I would also love to have a promising striker and maybe some players to the middle of the field. It is a five star intake, so there's hope!

November 2042. Magnificent win in the 1st round of FA Cup and then a bit more of a mixed bag of results. I'd say that if we'd won the Hartlepool game (like we deserved), I would've been very happy. The 2nd round of FA Cup was against South Shields, who are currently topping the League 2 table. It was one of the most boring games, as they just defended, took their only chance and won 1-0. A random spectator could have not guessed which side played in L2. Table. Even with a quite weak form, we are in the 8th position. There's a big gap between the 6th and the 7th (although Stockport does have multiple games in hand). Award. I didn't know this kind of award existed, very random time to announce the winner (in mid-November). The only "direction" that has this trophy, is Northwest, why?? International call-ups. 17-year old Arnison 41a is once again in the Gambia NT, good for him! I don't know what he has done to deserve the place, as he is not playing well. Almost even more surprising call-up is O'Connor 41h's to Ireland U19s. His on loan at Curzon Ashton in the Northern PL. He is playing okay, but there's nothing to suggest he would be interesting player for the Irish FA. Facility upgrade. We are average, yee-haw!!!! Finances. Two cup games = +€200k to the balance Upcoming fixtures. The FA Trophy starts for us with a game against Ebbsfleet, who play in the Isthmian League. We should ease past them, emphasis on should. December is the busiest month so far, so we will need all our players in shape. 1st XI will play the weekend games, 2nd XI the mid-week ones.

I don't know how we "eased past Sheffield United" when they had better chances to score goals, but still, win is a win!

October 2042. At the start of the month we were 20th in the league, so I hadn't the highest of expectations, but look at this! Win against Tranmere (who were topping the table at that moment) was massive and I felt that gave us so much hope in ourselves. This month also gave me some more motivation to continue playing. Table. Jumping to 11th (and only 3 points from playoffs), nice!!! New contract. They gave me +2 year contract when I went to ask for a new one (with + 1 if we get promoted). Sell-on clause. Finally!!! We've had so many worthless sell-on clauses that it makes me so happy to see one working. Wellenreuther 38b was still on loan with us last season and I didn't think his clause could be activated so soon. But it was active and as he hadn't played any games for Blackburn I thought this might be the best value we can get from the clause. €2,57m is so much money for us!!! Facility upgrade. Of course I wanted to use the money immediately... Well, I did not plan to use all the money, but youth facility upgrades are starting to be really, really expensive. Finances. A lot of things happening, but it doesn't show in the balance or profit graphs as these things happened during one month. We are in a healthy financial position Upcoming fixtures. A delicious cup game to start the month Sheffield United are currently a mid-table side in League 1. They are heavy favourites to the game, but it wouldn't be our biggest upset to win them! No matter what, we will get nice amount of ticket income from the game.

September 2042. This season is really going to test my motivation to play... We are not playing well, but we are not this bad! Worthing thrashed us, but the rest of the games were winnable and we had better xG than the opposition. Table. *Chuckles* I'm in danger! We are playing at mid-table level, but when we concede easy goals and don't score our easy chances, this is the result. Upcoming fixtures. October is really going to test us. In the league we face five teams from the top 9 (+ Sutton) and in the FA Cup we travel to Hartlepool (who are last in our league). If we don't play better, my place in charge of the team might be in danger for the first time in this save!

August 2042. Ummmmm... what I knew our team was a bit weaker than last season, but this is surprising, and not in a good way! 9 goals in 5 games isn't the worst, but conceding 12 is veeery bad. Maybe it will take time for our 1st XI to find its from after there were so many changes. There even was one after the start of the season as I sold Burdett 37d to Port Vale just because they suggested a transfer right when I was feeling very frustrated. Table. Well, we are still in mid-table positions, so the board is happy. I'm not Upcoming fixtures. Another quite "basic" month, maybe it is time to start winning games?

Season preview. One win away from promotion last season, but here we go again: another season in the National League. But no problem, this save has always been a slow-burner, there's still more than enough gas in the tank. This season's challenge is that we lost our three best players after they were sold (and loaned back to us for one more season). Their positions were RB, CM and AF. We will be fine with the RB, have some options for the midfield, but I don't know who will step up to spearhead our attacking trio. More about the players later in this post. Expectations. After a successful season the board is feeling more ambitious, I like it! Mid-table is very realistic, almost a tad pessimistic after finishing 2nd. Media predictions. Media predicts us as the 15th favourites for the title, in the exactly same position and with exactly same odds as the season before. That's actually positively surprising as we lost three of our key players. The profiles of our key player and hot prospect: 1st XI. Five new names to the 1st XI. I already mentioned that we lost RB, CM & AF, but I also decided to make some other changes. Lowndes 40k was amazing last season - and very consistent - so he took the place of Dugdale 31c. He also has always had really high average ratings (all the players in TM position have), but now it was time for some fresh blood. The other change was the DLP position as I thought Hayward 32k hadn't delivered that much to justify his position as one of the older players (26) in the squad. Icelandic Pétursson 39n will take his place for now. Our best young prospect Wakeham 42a would be good fit for the position, but I just think he's too young. Filling the gaps of the players that left us was somewhat of a challenge. RB position was quite straightforward decision: McGeechan 39e had a very good loan last season and he's our best RB, so he will probably cement his position in the 1st XI quickly. The CM (a) position was more challenging, but we made a signing(!) to play there. More about Roach MS in the transfer section of the preview. The major challenge was the AF position. Smith 40a was the star of the show in the attack, but even he had problems finding the net consistently. I'm not sure about my decision yet, but I will give Burdett 37d the nod. He has had multiple loans and last season he scored 17 goals in National League South. He should be ready for this level. But if not, we have multiple players relatively at the same level as he is. 2nd XI. Not too many 16-years olds this time. Multiple players who were on loan has now gotten their chance with us. Let's see who will take their chance and challenge for the place in the 1st XI. My eyes are on Franks 41f (CB), Opoku 41d (BBM), Wakeham 42a (DLP), and Arnison 41a (DLF). Reputation. When it comes to reputation, we are still one of the smaller teams in the league. But we are moving up, soon to be 1,5 star team! Finances. The club is upgrading its training facilities and that cost 2,2 m€, but we are still in the black. We had couple of financially beneficial friendlies that kept our summer losses to a minimum. Transfers. Loans + two free transfers out. Interesting to see Willem II signing our squad depth player! But the big thing is we signed a player - who is not our youth product! Roach MS is Montserratian like the MS country code suggests. I check the players from British Overseas Territories (and Crown Dependencies) couple of times a year and this time and offer trials for all the players who might have some potential. Usually all the players who are good reject us. Roach didn't! He has played 100+ games at this level and has a good personality so it was an easy decision to sign him. He wanted a non-contract, and I had no problem with that. He took the 1st XI place straight away, hopefully he delivers! Pre-season friendlies. Blackburn (CH) demolished us but it was much more even against the big boys of Wrexham (L1), Manchester United (PL) and Everton (CH). Upcoming fixtures. I'm a bit nervous how we get things started as our "new" players hasn't been fully gelled in to the 1st XI. But this set of fixtures shouldn't be the hardest, so we could be in a good position after August.