Guernsey FC - Making the green lions roar!

History

Well according to FM:

However in real life Guernsey FC were formed in 2011 as a community football club and are based in the Channel Islands (Guernsey). They joined the combined counties league in 2011 and within the last two seasons they have managed to get two promotions to get themselves into the Isthmian Division One South, this is also includes a league and cup double in 2011-12 which consisted of the Combined Counties football league Division One and the Premier Challenge Cup.

Club Info & Facilities

As they are at the start:

Philosophies

As stated by the Guernsey FA they want to give the island's elite players the opportunity to progress and test themselves in the English non league pyramid. This is perfect for me as it gives me an excuse to lay down some rules:

*Youth only (No new signings at any time)

*Keep the staff all British

This one is optional, but I will try to employ this:

*Keep an all Guernsey squad (Meaning a team consisting of only players born from Guernsey)

Objectives

This Season:

*Finish mid-table

* Have a half decent cup run

*Develop the youth setup

Long Term:

*Reach the top of the Non-league Pyramid

*Reach the Premier League

*Become European Champions (Europa League or Champions League)

*Have a top notch youth setup

Secondary Objectives (Optional):

*Achieve the above objectives with only players born from Guernsey

*Become national manager

Game Setup

All the English Leagues, Spanish Leagues, Italian Leagues and German Leagues (FMUpdates EEE expansion file & GFC Isthmian file enabled) most other in-game leagues on view only.

I have also looked into the GFC file and found some ridiculous CA and PA values for the players (which have now been put to a realistic level 15-35 CA this is on par with the mid tier teams , aswell as the facilities and other information which has all been set back to what SI have put for them, meaning it essentially is the same team just with their actual real life players put into the team).

If anyone wants to see the values the players have:

*Note some of the players in the squad were already in the game in the default database

Structure

It will be on a bi-monthly basis.

*Due to my inability to backup up my FM saved games, I have to restart this so I will post the first season in a seasonal structure, but afterwards I will change back to the normal structure.

Pre-Season

Starting up the save I noticed that the squad I had inherited was pretty poor and lacked depth in a few areas (mainly the centre of midfield) I also had the major problem of the fact that we had a high number of wingers so I eventually decided on a 4-4-2 with a wingers. Anyway I noticed we had players on mainly non-paid contracts and gave all current players a part time wage of £20 a week, always good to give a bit of pocket money. So I arranged some friendlies against some reserve teams from France to raise a small amount of cash, before playing some lower league teams:

As you can see we started off fairly well with a win against our under 21s and Havre Reserves, we then managed a credible draw to Brestois reserves before falling to a loss against Angers Reserves. After this I decided to arrange a few away friendlies with some local teams this proved to be a mistake however as we ended up losing all three ending the pre-season on sour note.

August

League

We started poorly with 1-3 loss to Herne Bay, I noticed during the match we had conceded some poor goals and our defence was leaving holes as well as our lack of creating enough chances. So I made some tactical tweaks and settled on a 4-5-1 with an AM as opposed to a DM this seems to have worked as we haven't lost once this month since. These results left us in a decent position:

Cups

Only one game but it was important that we progressed, as it brings much needed money into the coffers and we duly delivered with a hard fought win over Aveley.

September-October 2013

League

September proved to be a decent month with only one loss which was against Hythe at Home, however October on the other hand was possible one of the most boring months of Football Manager I have ever played as while it was unbeaten they were all 0-0 draws! soon after the third draw I was forced the change the mentality of the tactic which you will see the effects of in a later update.

These results did not affect us too badly as we only moved down two positions and still have games in hand over other teams.

Cups

If you want to ask me how the FA Trophy went, well lets just say we weren't even involved this season. The FA Cup on the otherhand was a different story after a fortunate win over Cray we then played a 1-1 draw with Hengrove as a result we had to do a replay in October and of course to start of the 0-0 month I get a lovely 0-0 draw, which is only overcome through a penalty shootout. Fortunately if the fans were sticking with us after that then they did get one entertaining match against our opponents Newhaven, where being 0-2 at half-time I was livid and I let the players know that so what did they do afterwards? they came out and conceded again however what happened next was unreal within the space of 10 minutes we pulled the score back to 3-3 and then nearly twenty minutes later put the score to 3-4 to us. The 90th minute got even more heated as we scored two more goals to assure ourselves of the victory before Newhaven finally pulled back a consolation goal. After the amazing turnaround I thought my players had turned a corner and would start scoring more but as shown through the league games after that really wasen't the case.

November-December 2013

League

After the cup loss more tactical tinkering was needed as I tried to find the right balance in the away games, thankfully after a few more game I managed to find a mentality that fits for the away games. November was a mixed bag as noted by our loss to the league leader Leatherhead and our loss to to play-off hopeful Merstham, this did improve however as the next month only saw one loss and as a result we moved up in the table:

We are doing much better than I expected and are sitting pretty nicely in the play-off spot.

January-Feburary 2014

League

The month started off with the board confidence telling me the fans didn't like the football I was playing, so with the fan day coming up on the first game of the month I changed my style of play which promptly lead to a 4-2 win over Crawley Down, we then managed some reasonable results for the next few games before hitting a small slump for the next four games with only two points out of 12. Since then however we seem to have picked ourselves up and managed a respectable 10 points out of 15 which has kept us in the play-off race.

The gap is pretty small one game could pull us up to 2nd and one loss down to 6th. This is encouraging and I can safely say I am easily surpassing my pre-season objective, I would like to have a crack at the play-offs if we could hold on, if it does happen then my worry would be that we would struggle in a higher division so I'm not too sure.

Youth Intake 2013-14

What I really need from this intake is a central midfielder, a new winger and maybe a defender wouldn't go amiss neither, so what did I get:

A pretty good intake and it answered all my problems, one player is already good enough to challenge my starting midfielders and two others can already provide good cover.

http://i812.photobucket.com/albums/zz50/Truegunner/FM 2014 Saves/Guernsey FC/Season 1/Newman-Y1_zps649d3ae7.png/'>Newman

Very good tackling for this level and has some fairly decent mentals, if I could improve his strength by quite a bit then he could be a good ball winning midfielder for the non-league levels.

http://i812.photobucket.com/albums/zz50/Truegunner/FM%202014%20Saves/Guernsey%20FC/Season%201/Lovegrove-Y1_zpsc8f08671.png/'>Lovergrove

Same case as above although he seems to have better mentals that are required for a ball winner as well as better physicals, he may end up being my DM in the tactic.

http://i812.photobucket.com/albums/zz50/Truegunner/FM%202014%20Saves/Guernsey%20FC/Season%201/Basham-Y1_zps5be1485f.png/'>Basham

Not a bad fullback, will need some work on his pace and acceleration though and possible his crossing but still a handy player should prove to be useful cover.

March-April 2014

League

We opened up the month with a frustrating home loss to top team Leatherhead in a game where we dominated but struggled to convert this then followed two decent results before getting a 0-2 loss to Peacehaven, worried about us bottling our chance at the play-off and about our leaky defence I switched to a new formation and the results were evident to see with three consecutive 1-0 wins. However we were struggling to score and the next two matches I tried numerous tweaks to sort this and I ended up with some pitiful draws despite having the most chances and possession in these games it didn't help though that our bet player who is incidentally the best finisher in this league(15 finishing!) was injured during this spell, despite this we somehow managed:

Even though we stuttered towards the finish we managed to secure a play-of spot, but it was so tight had we lost we could of ended up 6th (depending on how big the loss was) anyway its now off to the play-offs, where I don't mind who we face as long as it's not Horsham, so who have we got? Horsham of course they are highest scoring team in the league and finished second I'm not looking forward to this and to make matters worse the match it away, atleast the fans should be entertained right?

End of Season Update

League

The game went exactly as expected, at least we gave it a good fight and for the first 45 minutes we were dominant but not converting, I tried going more attacking in the second half but unfortunately we just conceded goals this game tells the story of the whole season our failure to convert chances which has cost us time and time again this season.

Player of the year

http://i812.photobucket.com/albums/zz50/Truegunner/FM 2014 Saves/Guernsey FC/Season 1/RossAllen_zps106bbe37.png/'>Ross Allen

Forgot to take a screenshot before the statistics moved to the history screen:

Apps:40 Gls: 21 Asts: 3 PoM: 4 Avg: 6.88

Was the key to our suprise finish this year and his effect on us is evident when our lapses in form happened, it shows just how much he was really missed.

Youth player of the year

http://i812.photobucket.com/albums/zz50/Truegunner/FM%202014%20Saves/Guernsey%20FC/Season%201/DavidMoss_zps48b41f3b.png/'>David Moss

Screenshot forgotten on this player aswell:

Apps: 37 Gls: 5 Asts: 6 PoM: 2 Avg: 6.73

Didn't have too bad a rookie year and played a fairly big part in our success, probably is the most promising of the youngsters I have at the club and I can see him being the player that could take us far.

Objectives

Short term:

*Finish mid-table - Achieved(finished 4th)

* Have a half decent cup run - Achieved(FA Cup 4th qualifying round)

*Develop the youth setup - Achieved(Improved youth coaching)

Next Season:

*Challenge for play-offs

*Have a decent cup run

*improve facilities or youth coaching

End of Season Update (Season 1 Redo)

League

League Results Part 1

League Results Part 2

Sticking with the tactic I used the first time round it seems to have worked wonders with my team. After we started with a poor 0-0 draw we went through a good spell of 12 games unbeaten taking us to the top of the league. However the honeymoon period was quickly over as we lost the next three games without a single goal, throughout the rest of the season we were very consistent which kept us in the top 3 all season. This put us in a great position come the end of the season:

League Table

We only went and done it! despite being shaky in some places towards the last few games we managed to take back top spot and held onto it, I couldn't quite believe how we performed. There is one worry in the back of my mind though as the squad we have is clearly not good enough, it doesn't help the fact that come youth intake day I signed my three most promising youngsters and didn't sign the rest (as I assumed my head of youth had signed them for me!) so the squad will be tested to the limit next season.

Cup

Cup Results

Knocked out of the FA Trophy at the first hurdle so that's a non story. The FA cup on the other hand was pretty good however the first match to Bowers & Pitsea proved tough, despite the early converted penalty we couldn't convert another despite controlling the game. The replay proved even tougher as we played an even game and only just got through thanks to a lucky own goal we were then drawn to Hendon a side who was one league above us and we had to play them away. The team did me proud and proved to be the better team all match leading to a good victory, the adventure continued as we were given Skrill South side Chelmsford. They had many more chances, but we controlled the game they missed chance after chance, we went 2-0 up after 50 minutes but they immediately improved a scored from a well executed counter just one minute later I quickly shut up shop in the hope they wouldn't score again and thankfully Heaume scored later in the match to grind out the win. Fortunately the next round gave us an easy team Folland despite them seeming "easy" they outplayed us the entire match and Heaume had to be our hero here as his goal saw us through the tie. The dream run continued with another scalp against Hayes & Yeading where just like the Chelmsford game we proved we were the better team, having reached the first round I hoped for a big tie against a league side to generate some money unfortunately we only got Eastbourne Borough away and this is where our run ended. Overall I was very pleased at our performance this year and look forward to how we do in the FA Cup next time around.

Player of the year

Ross Allen

This time I got the screenshot at the right time . He was excellent this year without him we probably wouldn't have even reached the play-offs, so I am pleased he didn't pick up too many injuries he will be mighty important next year.

Youth player of the year

Tom Martin

Played pretty well for the most part and gave solid cover for Glenn Dyer during Glenn Dyer's injury, has some potential so he may be useful for another year or two.

Youth Intake 2013-14 (Small update)

For just this one season I will give a small mini update in this write up:

Yinka Kennet

Looks like a big talent! and is in one of my weak positions so he is exactly what I need although he could use some heavy work on his pace and acceleration.

Glen Lowe

Not bad could use some work on his defending attributes as I see him as a future deep play maker for the team. Not a fan of that poor determination though.

Viv Sherwood

Quite a handy utility player for us to have and gives me some good cover across all three positions, could be a future captain is he can work on those mental attributes.

Objectives

Next Season:

*Stay Up

*Have a decent cup run

*Improve Youth coaching

Pre-Season

Board Expectation: Mid-table

My Expectation: Mid-table

This year I tried to maximise our earnings as much as possible, so by arranging friendlies against the likes of Brighton and Aston Villa did manage to generate some money. Of course it didn't he to generate wins but still we put in two decent performances considering the level we are at and the level these two teams are at. The nest three friendlies were poor and at that point I gave up hoping that we would win a pre-season game, thankfully we won our last one but only after the players preceded to nearly choke a 3-0 lead. All in all I would say a decent pre-season.

August

League

The first game gave an undeserved loss in a game where were even with the opposition throughout. However our next game was much better after starting the game well we conceded in the first 10 minutes and I then thought this would be a repeat of the Banbury match, but it seemed the players had other ideas and Ross Allen went and became unstoppable we completely turned the game on its head powering to a 5-2 win. This seems to have inspired the players as in the next four games we only dropped two points, putting us in:

I am not getting ahead of myself, yes its a good start but my objective remains the same (well ok on level with the board mid-table) stay up and progress from there anything else is a bonus.

September-October 2014

League

Our good start in the league countinued as we went through September with only one loss. We then managed three wins on the trot before taking a point in the last game of October, this great start to the season, we even managed to beat Poole Town whom at the time of playing them had won 6 out of 7 games and were unbeaten. This has put us in an incredible position:

Third with a game in hand which could take us top, we shouldn't be in this position and it feels like we are massively overachieving I'm just waiting for the dreaded part of the season where we will struggle to even score because we all know that happens after a good start .

Cups

Wondering how I did in the FA Trophy? don't ask as it was a non event this year. The FA cup is always good for a good cup run and this has been achieved thus far, as shown in the screenshot we've had a fairly relaxed ride this year with comprehensive wins against Potters Bar and Winchester. Against Whitehawk however was a much more difficult affair as we went 2-0 and conceded minutes later and somehow managed to hold on for a Skrill scalp. We kept up our good run against the Skrill sides with another scrappy win against Tonbridge, our reward for this was a 1st round encounter against Crawley away. The last cup we have been entered in is the Southern Premier League Cup which although I don't see as important is still worth trying to win, we got quite lucky as we only just edged a tight game through penalties.

November-December 2014

League

These next two months were vital as this would tell me if we were serious about challenging for the play-off spots or going to slip into a relegation battle. Surprisingly we excelled, after some scrappy wins to start off the month we took a solid point at Kings Lynn which put us back on top of the league! After this we managed another win against Rugby ended the month having only dropped points in one game. The next month was even better although it started with a bore draw at home against Hungerford we won the next five games, this run had already put us on top:

This is really a pleasant surprise, I didn't think the squad was good enough but so far the likes of Ross Allen and Chris Tardiff are clearly proving me wrong. I didn't even expect to be in the top 5 at this point in the season let alone top 9 points clear of 2nd. This surely can't last?

Cups

Well in the FA Cup we were brought back to earth and taught a football lesson by Crawley. We played fairly well for the first ten minutes before Cochrane made a rash tackle leading to Crawley being awarded a penalty, this left us 1-0 down within the first 10 minutes, after this we never got going and by half time found ourselves 4-0 down. Angry I told the players to get some pride and it seemed to do the trick as in the second half we came back a different team and Allen netted in the 61st minute to bring down the deficit, unfortunately soon after the game evened up and neither side scored again, and the match ended 4-1 and with it our FA Cup journey. On another note the other cup this month was at least successful as we booked ourselves a place in the 3rd round after a relatively easy win over Aylesbury.

January 2015-February 2015

League

The month started with a 2-2 draw with Dorchester a game where both sides deserved to win, this was then followed up by a hard-fought draw over third placed Corby, we continued this impressive run with 10 more points in the next four games. However the next game against play-off hopefuls Poole Town inflicted our first loss in months, the next two games were navigated without too much trouble and helped us extend our lead at the top. The last game of the two months ended in a loss, despite this we were well placed:

Still top of the league and with a nice gap, its safe to say barring a major screw-up or major downturn in form we have this title in the bag or at least the play-offs .

Cups

The third round of this cup was rather easy and despite Hemel being 2nd in the table at the time of playing them. We then were given a tricky away game against Dorchester where we managed to grind out a deserved 2-1 win after nearly bottling it after going 2-0 up. The last cup game of the month however was a complete farce. We went 1-0 down just 8 minutes into the game and then Cochrane made a poor tackle giving away a freekick reducing us to ten men! It got worse as Kings Lynn proceeded to score the free kick, they then came back with a third minutes later and we went in 3-0 down. Despite our best efforts the next half we couldn't reduce the deficit and it got worse after a well timed play from Standen (Kings Lynn player), as a result we ended up losing 4-0 and with that bowed out of the cup. Needless to say I am proud of their run to the semi-finals and a good learning curve for some of the squad particularly the youngsters, however we must make sure this match does not affect us (which I fear it has as we lost the league just after the cup game).

Youth Intake 2014-15

I badly needed another central midfielder, as well as a goalkeeper to replace Tardiff in a few years:

Looks great on paper especially as along with the strikers the AMC can play on the wings. However I didn't need any more strikers as Ross Allen has still been exceptional and the Goalkeeper I got can only really fill a no 3 slot so essentially its not a brilliant intake, still the defenders I got should balance out the intake.

Oakes

Great finishing and some decent physicals make him look a potent striker at this level, just needs to work on his pace and we will have a deadly poacher!

Duly

As it says could be one heck of a target man, however as we are short in the centre of midfield I am going to retrain him and make him into a deep lying play maker, needs some heavy work on his technical ability though.

Anderton

Now this is a player I'm excited about! already has some pace and some dribbling and crossing ability, on the other hand he will still need to improve these a little more but for the moment he is now the best winger in my team.

March 2015-April 2015

League

Well that's a way to bottle it, I know it must have been hard to recover after the cup game but this is just disappointing after leading the table for most of the season. We just seem to have completely thrown it away with the win against Kings Lynn I thought we would recover and get the points required to go up, instead we lost all confidence and didn't pick up a single win for the next four games, during all this time Corby kept picking up points and jumped from 3rd and leapfrogged up. Annoyingly when there was the faintest chance of 1st still being available in the last game we finally win and of course Corby won leaves us to compete in the play-offs, thankfully we have won in the semi-final (we seem to have picked up form again and are looking forward to the play-off final.

The major screw-up of course happened . However on the positive side we were never in danger of relinquishing 2nd, it would be very frustrating if we lost in the final as all that hard work from this season would have been for nothing.

End of Season Update

League

After a frustrating end to the season which saw us bottle our title charge. Your probably wondering how the match played out. If I'm going to be honest it was very dull as us and Poole both had some very good chances and couldn't finish them, we even had more possession and more shots on target so our finishing was lacklustre to say the least. We fared no better in extra time and as neither side could break the deadlock we ended up having penalties:

Nunn steps up for Poole Town...

NUNN SCORES! 1-0

Allen does his run up...

ALLEN SCORES! 1-1

Else takes the penalty...

ELSE SCORES! 2-1

Benjamin for Guernsey...

BENJAMIN SCORES! 2-2

Dunford's chance...

DUNFORD SCORES! 3-2

Kennet with his chance...

KENNET SCORES! 3-3

Young places his shot...

YOUNG SCORES! 4-3

Team captain Mackay takes this penalty...

MACKAY SCORES!4-4

Dossou strikes his penalty...

DOSSOU SCORES! 5-4

Dodd has to score to keep Guernsey in the game...

Dodd keeps a cool head and SCORES! 5-5

Shuttleworth can not afford to miss this...

SHUTTLEWORTH MISSES! 5-5

If Dyer scores this then Guernsey are promoted...

DYER stutters and misplaces his shot but SCORES! 6-5

That's it Guernsey have won the shoot-out and promotion!

So as you have read not a bad end to the season .

Player of the year

http://i812.photobucket.com/albums/zz50/Truegunner/FM 2014 Saves/Guernsey Reboot/Season 2/RossAllen-14-15_zpsf80e263f.png/'>Ross Allen

Again simply unstoppable, if he keeps this up he might become a club icon or legend. However I do think the Skrill leagues might be as high as can achieve.

Youth player of the year

http://i812.photobucket.com/albums/zz50/Truegunner/FM 2014 Saves/Guernsey Reboot/Season 2/YinkaKennet-YPY14-15_zps575de15f.png/'>Yinka Kennet

Great year from the youngster and may be a mainstay in the team for a few years to come hopefully, he does still lack some quickness but other than that played very well when called upon.

Objectives

Short term:

*Challenge for the play-offs - Achieved(Play-off winners)

*Have a decent cup run - Achieved(FA Cup 1st round)

*Improve facilities or youth coaching - Achieved(Improved youth coaching)

Next Season:

*Survive

*Do better in the FA Trophy

*Improve facilities