Pre-season
When the new season started I got an email that the board expected me to win the league, Isthmian Division One South, but they dropped the weekly budget down to £104K p/w. However will I survive?! (Spending as of 25 June 2014 was £4,374 p/w.)
As the pre-season drew to a close, the board allowed me to offer £91,000 for a squad win bonus if we take the league. That oughta motivate them! (By the way, we are 4:6 odds to win the league.)
I totally forgot to set up friendlies until 23 June, whoops!
Pre-season schedule:
· 29.6.2014: Hosting Havre Athletic Club Reserves (they’re French)
· 2.7.2014: Visiting Charlton
· 5.7.2014: Hosting AFC Wimbledon (Brian Lane's favorite club)
· 8.7.2014: Visiting Raunds
· 11.7.2014: Hosting Buckingham
· 13.7.2014: Visiting Oxford City Nomads
· 16.7.2014: Hosting Letcombe
· 19.7.2014: Hosting Q.P.R.
· 23.7.2014: Visiting Enfield
· 26.7.2014: Visiting Barton Rovers
· 29.7.2014: Visiting Wokingham
· 1.8.2014: Hosting Wealdstone
· 4.8.2014: Hosting Wootton
For those of you who are not up on their English geography, all the teams above are in the London area (less Le Havre). I keep travel costs down and it gives me a sense of realism as a real team this low isn’t going to try to bus up to Newcastle.
Brixton also gets invitations to join U18 and U21 leagues. I accept the U18 invite but reject the U21. I of course accepted the U18 because I enjoy the man management aspect of Football Manager and the board insisted I do so too. But I don’t have the bodies for U21 this season so I pulled out.
New Players
I’ve been scouting like a champ the whole off-season but either the players suck or they want way too much money or they have absolutely no interest in joining us. I mean, I’m generally happy with the team but have realized I could do better at MR/AMR. Hence:
David Connolly
David Connolly, M RC, AM C (Stars: 2.0/4.5) Finally found another player with great Stamina. He’ll be a fixture for years. He’ll be our first choice for AMR and will be able to slide into MC r (BBM) if we have a late lead and need to switch to the Anchor formation. He has a Resolute personality and is Consistent. Doesn’t have much in the way of Technical skills but at this level it shouldn’t matter too much.
Formations
I added the Arrow and 3-3-2-2 formations to the repertoire for the pre-season. Eventually I’ll replace the 4-4-2 Control with a 4-4-2 Diamond Counter-Attack, and 3-3-2-2 with the Anchor. In the meantime, the learnings are going so well. I use the Arrow for all our friendlies to get the players comfortable with it.
Friendly Results
· Havre: 2-0. A mediocre performance except for Dunne and Farquhar.
· Charlton: 0-4. Mostly U18 who stink up the joint including a 5.5 from Anderson
· AFC Wimbledon: 3-5. Another disaster except for Bowerman.
· Raunds: 2-0. Much better all-around with Todd getting POM.
· Buckingham: 8-3. Yes, things are clicking now. Allan finally scores.
· Oxford City: 3-1. Still learning the new formations but things go well.
· Letcombe: 2-2. And then a step back. Bodin and Barness have been particularly putrid.
· Q.P.R.: 0-0. Not too bad considering we get off 1 shot to their 17. They should have slaughtered us. And we made £35,809.
· Enfield: 6-1. Another Bowerman hat-trick. Great first half by the expected starters, mediocre second half by the back-ups.
· Barton Rovers: 1-2. A slight step back by the U18s.
· Wokingham: 8-0. Now that's what I call a pre-season hammering! With an Allan hat-trick!
· Wealdstone: 6-5. What a fun match! Back-and-forth the whole match. Mcconachie saves us in the 87th minute.
· Wootton: 4-1. The starters do a great job and the back-ups allow an 89th minute goal.
· Aldershot U18s: 5-2. Not all my yutes were match fit so I dropped them back down and went after a local teams’ yutes.
An acceptable pre-season considering we are introducing two new formations and I used U18s in the Seniors a lot. Our familiarity with the Arrow is all Accomplished or Fluid, except Creative Freedom, which is only Competent. The 3-3-2-2 is barely improving but I haven’t focused on it at all.
Here’s a look at our Tactical Familiarity as of 5 August, the day after our last friendly.
Tactics at End of Pre-season
So concludes the 2014/2015 Pre-season. I'm feeling very confident. Our 4-4-2 Control formation is our strongest but I'll want to use the Arrow as soon as possible.