f1dave

My Aussie study is hot enough this summer - if I loaded that, I'm fairly sure my PC would melt through the floor!

*Shudder* Also, F@%! Linfield.

Farsley Celtic, 2023/24 Vanarama National League North The aging defence got a youthful infusion as I brought in 19yo CB Charlie who simply wasn't good enough for the youth ranks of a bigger team, and local boy Nan who interestingly enough was once a youngster at our rivals Guiseley, 15 minutes up the road. With one of the old heads staying on and last year's find of the season Manuel behind them, the idea was to build a solid defensive foundation. I also managed to bring in Homer on a free after Boro released him to me after last year's excellent loan spell on the right. I also brought in The Cuban, a Scouser who'd been playing half an hour down the road at Halifax - or not playing, rather. The fact he could play all along the front meant I could tempt him with regular game time, as cover for my existing players if nothing else. A few loans rounded out the transfer action to provide general depth. Cups were crap, nothing much to say there. We made it to the FA Cup 4th Qualifying round before eventual Vanarama National champs Chesterfield dumped us out on a replay. FA Trophy we got to the third round before The Cuban's former side punished us for picking him up - and naturally, he played like hot garbage. In fact the only notable thing about this game was it went to penalties and took nine of them from each side for Halifax to triumph 5-4. The league was my main focus - the board wanted survival to establish ourselves as a regular at this level, and I was pretty confident we'd do that easily. As it turned out, I should have been even more confident - for most of the season, we were actually fighting for a playoff spot. Closing in on the final two games of the season, we held on to 7th position and the final playoff spot by one point from Basford United. Eventual champs South Shields beat us 1-0 on their patch, but Basford lost as well. Last game of the season was at home to King's Lynn and Homer decided to celebrate by getting a straight red for two footing someone 15 minutes into the game (the FA gave him an additional two weeks, as well!). Considering Basford had gone 2-1 up it was backs to the wall from this point on - The Cuban smoked the Kings Lynn defence twice on the break however to secure a 2-0 win and book our playoff spot. We were drawn against Kidderminster for a game 3 days later and the tired legs of the squad couldn't hold out and we dropped to a 3-2 loss, despite a good effort from 17 year old youth product Urkle, a hot prospect striker I hope to give more game time to next year. All in all, the board and fans are super happy - the only blot on the copybook is I'm losing Manuel to a Polish club on a transfer. The eight and a half thousand pounds we'll get (with possible additions down the track) is at least a club record, but he's going to be very hard to replace.

This is the realism thread, right?

Took over Farsley Celtic, predicted to finish 22nd in the league with an extremely thin squad. Fans and board had low expectations, to say the least. Looking at the squad, while there were definitely holes the rest of the fabric wasn't actually that bad. I was quietly confident that the right additions could make all the difference and see us stay up. Extremely versatile MC/DR/AMR Lizard was a loanee who could practically do it all, and a fellow loan player in the midfield was an excellent defensive foil. We had some old and rickety centre halves who were nonetheless very solid gatekeepers. Attack was the main weakness, so I brought in a loanee striker and a bit later in the season loaned Homer, an attacking right winger. My only real contract signings of note were my new keeper Manuel and up and coming midfielder Sonny, both who were released by bigger teams nearby after being told they weren't good enough. We settled on a tactic relatively early and had an excellent start to the season - solid but unspectacular results that showed we were very hard to beat, and a gradual climb up the table until by 1/4 of the way in people were talking about how we were potentially going to compete for a playoff spot. Then we had a couple of injuries and some players fall off a cliff (the centre halves in particular showed that ageing legs get no faster) and we went on a horrific run of form. This was punctured by a couple of brief revivals where we got genuinely good results - among them a 0-0 at Chester who were second at the time, and 2-1 at Kidderminster which put paid to their promotion hopes. This blip was just enough to stop us being thrown in the relegation mix. We were mentioned in a couple of 'scrap for relegation' media pieces but realistically always had a two or three game buffer. Eventually we maintained this right to the end and survival was assured with two weeks to go. Board and fans are happy enough, and want the same next year. Age means I need to replace 3/4 of my defence, which I'm not unhappy about considering the amount of times I saw them confusing Conference football for Walking football as strikers sprinted on through the line.

KUTGW there SF, it's always nice when your extra-lower league team isn't just continual cack

^ Similar note, I ended up abandoning my FM20T save because a) FM23 was 1/3 of the normal price b) The match engine was starting to ruin things for me on my save. Essentially I was, no matter which of three different formations and tactics I used, constantly on the end of long shots. And I mean _long_ shots. I can live with a few hit and hopers going in but it was maybe 2 in every 3 games where semi-pros with poor shooting and long shot stats were drilling absolute thunderbastards into the net. Anyway, I'm pleased to report FM23 doesn't show the same problems and I'm gamely trying to make a fist of it with Farsley Celtic in the Conference North. EDIT: After sitting down and carefully planning a change in tactic for about 20 minutes, desperate to break my team's winning run, my best player has decided to two-foot someone in the first minute and receive a straight red.

I am SF, thanks for asking. Could do with a centre back with half a clue, mind.

Hi to some familiar names Back on the wagon after a long time off. Been playing a bit of FM2020 Touch because I'm just not going to have the time for the full thing at present. Started at Tonbridge, got sacked. Was hired by King's Lynn, and after 15 games "the board are deeply saddened by your leadership of the team". I am nothing if not consistent.