Something From Nothing - Legends from Youth Only

[OzWes]

Something From Nothing Football Club

It is every football fan's dream from the age of 5 to 105 to one day represent their team, their nation or fulfill all fantasies, hoisting the famous World Cup trophy.  From a young age I've had a fascination with all things football, and as such Football Manager was a place for me to spitball footballing concepts.

I've had many saves over the years; most unsuccessful, but a remaining few still linger in my head with an admiring mind's eye.

Enough idle notions of past glories, onto the feats to come.

 

Something From Nothing Football Club currently play in the 13th tier of English football (FM22 - Level 13 England database used), and as such are many, many moons from lifting any trophy I've ever heard of.  However, the name stuck out to me as I perused the teams that I could start as on this adventure.

I've wished to do a "Youth Academy Challenge" for a long time, all previous attempts have resulted in me feeling a little lost and defeated, but I'm willing to give this my best shot.

As a 27 year old manager, I'm looking for 12 promotions, 13 different titles, European and World glory with this side, but I'm fully capable of waiting our turn.

 

The side play at "Wanstead Flats", a ground of 300 capacity - far from the enamored 100,000+ we're dreaming of, but a start no less.

They wish for me to finish in the Top Half of the "Essex Alliance League Division One" this season, and look to win promotion up to the "Essex Alliance League Premier Division" next season, and to remain a side from there on out for the rest of the 5 year vision.

Hopefully, the inexperience and lack of managers will affect the teams around us and we can make a quick push this season for promotion and begin working our way up, although relying only on our youth prospects does mean that we'll face a few more problems than that along our way.

The side is made up of newgens, and we have a few staff members already. The former is a normalised concept, the latter is just something that is my least favourite part of starting this low in a save.

 

The team is largely made up of Englishmen, along with a 16 year old Irish goalkeeper, a Canadian 22 year old goalkeeper, a 28 year old midfielder from Barbados, and a 15 year old prospect in central defence from Tanzania.

Our best player, Giles Clark, is a ball winning midfielder with 20 aggression, 11 teamwork, 12 vision and 13 team work, as well as some other reasonable technical and mental stats.  The problem is he's wanted by 40 different teams right now, so we'll likely face an uphill battle keeping him.

We have a few youth players in our Under 23s and Under 18s, though nobody particularly stand-out for the upcoming season.

 

We'll be opting for a 4-2-3-1 tactic that plays positively with minimal instructions besides those which I feel benefit the style of play I'd like to have in this save - namely contesting for the ball and focusing play through the middle for our mezalla, inside forwards, and attacking midfielder to have control of the attacking third of the pitch.

I'll be making U23 players available for the first team also, since they have no fixtures to handle at this time, and I also feel that giving some of the more youthful prospects some game time earlier on will not only help them to build confidence around the team, but also an attachment that will allow for us to keep as many team members as possible before the youth candidates come through later on in the year.

With all that said and done, it's time to get to work and to hopefully, build Something From Nothing