officiallydeej

I last played Southend in the National League South in 2025/26 when they dominated the league and battered me twice. Fast forward 7 years and 3 promotions each, revenge is (belatedly) sweet!

Dulwich Hamlet - 2031/32 Sky Bet League Two - 7th (Playoff Winners!) This was not in the script!! An absolutely incredible first season in the Football League has seen us win our second successive playoff final which sees us into League One for next season. This season was amazing in so many ways, no least because we were only in the playoffs places once all season, straight after game week 46! We were in mixed form for the first half of the season, often holding our own at home and getting beaten easily away. After the autumn fixture build up we were actually as low as 19th and for at least a half of the season in with a genuine chance of going back down. As we hit new year and the fixture list thinned out everything just seemed to click. We lost 12 games in 2031 but as soon as the new year ticked over we only lost 3 times more all season, winning every other game expect one draw. We went into the final game of the season in 8th place, but a nervy 1-0 win at Burton coupled with a defeat for Milton Keynes saw us sneak the last play off place. I still didn't really expect much as we faced Chesterfield who had beaten us twice already including a 5-0 beating away early in the campaign. We played them at home first and not only beat them 1-0 but absolutely played them off the park. I still feared they'd turn us over away, but in what was probably our best performance of the season we went and won 2-0 to set up a playoff final with York. The final was fairly one sided and probably not as close as a 3-1 score line might look. We have an xG of 3.5 and even at 1-1 I was always confident we'd beat them in the second half. This feels a bit like groundhog day but outside a couple of stars our squad is barely National League standard never mind League One and I can't see this overachieving continuing. I'll again be happy with 20th and survival for a few seasons until our infrastructure and youth products catch up to our overachievement. I've said this already but this season is probably in my top 5 ever in FM, just because of the sheer unlikeliness and how we didn't enter the playoff spots once until the last game. Cups I said last season I wasn't going to put up much of a fight in the cups to minimise fixture congestion and we lived up to that hype, losing all 5 cup games we played this season. Our juniors lost 3-2 at Port Vale in the League Cup and got hammered 6-1 by Bolton in the FA Cup. We were drawn with Fulham u21s, Maidstone United and Walsall in the FL Trophy who beat us 6-3, 1-0 and 6-3 respectively. Not only did we not prioritise them we conceded 22 goals in 5 games, quite some going! Star Players We continued our attacking style of play this season, scoring 132 and conceding 114 in what is probably a reflection of a currently unbalanced match engine. That won't bother Jonathan Jewell 29a though, who continued to push our best player Caldwell out of position with an incredible return of 43 goals and 5 assists in 45 starts. He isn't rated as highly as some of our other strikers but is a deadly poacher as this level and now has 90 goals for the club in only 123 appearances. We play a traditional front two and James McHardy 27b more than pulled his weight, with 34 goals and 22 assists in 43 starts. It means between them our strikes scored 77 goals between them, easily the most I've had since the old old Football Manager or CM games. Both are tied to long contracts and if we have any hope of staying up next season their goals will be key. Drey Beaney 26b is a new entry and the only player left at the club from the disappointing 2026 intake. He's taken the attacking midfield role filled by former stars Paul Moro and Rakeem Thomas and didn't disappoint with 13 goals and 12 assists in 37 starts. Youth Intake Our best intake for 7 seasons, at least on paper and certainly reason at last to be optimistic for the longer term future. One 5* prospect and six 4* talents might be skewed by us losing our best player last season but is still not to be sniffed at. Delane Stewart has the highest potential and coupled with a good personality I am hoping he can go far. He's the third good right back to come through in 3 years however so won't immediately be in the first team. We have more issues at left back so Chris Freeman is a welcome addition. He'll need retraining from his current wing back role as I dropped that position a couple of seasons ago but he has a nice attribute base to work from and probably will be at least on the bench in the near future. Admin The only bad news coming from the club this season hails from the finance department. Although only showing us £44k in the red that number is largely skewed by the playoff final which pumped over 600k into the coffers. We lost over £1m over the course of the season excluding the Wembley gate receipts and I'm not sure there's much more money in League One to help. Our board did their usual pointless expansion last summer and added another 800 seats for 500k. Confirmation of Rakeem Thomas leaving us last summer for Queens Park where he ended up top scorer with 13. I also loaned two players to Kingstonian who used to be in and around the first team but unfortunately they couldn't prevent their loan club finishing bottom of the National League South.

Dulwich Hamlet - 2029/30 Vanarama National League - 4th (Playoff Winners!) What a way to bounce back from our disappointing mid table campaign last season! We flew out of the traps and were top of the league until fatigue hit us in November. Our form generally held this season though and although Gillingham ended up winning the league at a canter we finished 4th on 85 points, our highest total in the National League so far. We played attacking football this season, scoring a frankly ridiculous 135 league goals and conceding an equally bizarre 87. Into the playoffs and we battered Hartlepool 6-2 in the first round, with 4 goals from our striking sensation Jonathan Jewell 29a (more on him later). We then beat Stevenage 1-0 in the semi final in what was both of lowest scoring game of the season. Other than a 2-0 every one of our games had at least three goals with the highest scoring being an early season 8-3 dismantling of Dartford who would go on to register only 14 points and concede a record breaking 136 goals. The final was a true nail biter. Rakeem Thomas 25b gave us the lead in what was going to be his final game for the club. Our best player has agreed to join Queens Park on a free (no compensation again grr!) but was determined to go out with a bang. That lead held until the 95th minute when a cross from the left broke our hearts with an equaliser taking my exhausted team to extra time. We managed to pick ourselves up and 16 year old substitute full back Sam Mole 30c picked the perfect time to score his first career goal! That still wasn't enough as Gateshead carved through us again to equalise. The penalty shootout saw a fitting end to Thomas's Dulwich Hamlet career, sending the keeper the wrong way with his final kick in a Hamlet shirt to send us into the football league! I've been doing this challenge for years, sometimes posting here and sometimes not, but this is the first time I've ever got into the league in England. I've no idea how next season will go but I can't wait to get started. Cups On the face of it this doesn't look that exciting, a first round defeat by Doncaster in the FA cup wasn't anything to write home about. The interesting part of this however lies in the trophy. I was on a 6 game winning run going into the Bromley game, who although I didn't take much notice noted they were in the National League South and so with a full team out I expected to beat them comfortably. That wasn't the case and they absolutely battered us 4-0 on our own patch. I had a look into them after the game and found out that the tycoon who was sniffing around us a couple of years ago actually bought Bromley last summer! They won the National League South with 117 points and only 1 defeat and I'll be keeping an eye on how far they can go before the money runs out. Star Players After scoring so many goals it's no real surprise three attacking players are here again. A first appearance for Jonathan Jewell 29a was well deserved after an incredible return of 32 goals and 9 assists in only 29 starts. He's only actually my third best striker on paper and started the season on the bench, but I couldn't keep ignoring his true poacher instinct after he kept popping up with goal after goal. He displaced Caldwell from the team entirely in the last 10 games and repaid my faith with 4 goals in the first playoff and an ice cool pen in the shootout in the final. Sam Caldwell 25b also makes this list but as mentioned above actually finished the season either on the bench or playing deeper in midfield. He still managed 17 goals and 17 assists in 30 starts, but he is unhappy and with only one year left may leave us next summer. The saving grace is he's done this twice before and mellowed before signing a new contract each time. I couldn't leave Rakeem Thomas 25b out considering his heroics in his final game for the club. His last season was his best yet, registering 18 goals and 13 assists from his inside forward role. He leaves us 83 goals in a whopping 247 appearances since coming through in the golden 2025 intake. He is also a regular for his country scoring 19 times so far in 42 caps for Antigua and Barbuda. He leaves us for Queens Park who are now established in the SPL and will be facing off against Paul Moro 25a who has just completed his third season with Dundee. Youth Intake There's quite a bit of potential here and it's probably the best intake I've had since 2025. Two casual personalities isn't ideal however and I don't currently have any tutors to fix that. I like the look of Mark Goddard, a tough tackling full back who I can definitely work with. Right back is a position we aren't strong in and he's likely to see some minutes next season. Darragh Kelly is another player I like the look of, and with both Rakeem Thomas and his understudy not signing contracts and leaving us this summer Kelly is, perhaps alarmingly, our strongest remaining left winger at the club. Admin Our finances are still in the black, though this was helped by making the playoff final at Wembley. I don't think there is much more money in League Two next season, and with my squad paper thin already I probably won't have much of a go at either the League Cup or FL Trophy, at least for the first season or two. We sold out quite a few home games and I imagine it's only a matter of time before the board get giddy and take out another loan and start expanding again. No transfers out, Chad went to Bognor Regis on loan but will be coming back next season to help Kelly fill the left winger void. I've no idea what to expect next season and I don't know how big the leap is. Some teams seem to go up and sail through (Crawley who I played in the 2029 Fa Trophy final are now half way up League One), and others like last year's National League winners Ebbsfleet end up cut adrift and come back down with a whimper. I have no ambitions whatsoever expect finish 22nd and hope the intakes continue to improve. By rights our squad probably wasn't good enough to go up, we were predicted 24th by a large margin so we'll have to see how our all out attack fairs at the next level.

This happened in 2027 but we ended up being taken over by a local consortium. Fast forward 4 years and apparently another tycoon is sniffing..

I find the same. I'm doing well playing more attacking this season but after 13 games I've scored 49 (almost 4 a game!) and conceded 25 already. If I keep going at this pace I'll score about 180 goals.

Dulwich Hamlet - 2029/30 Vanarama National League - 14th Our lowest finish in the National League so far but probably a fair reflection of where my squad is at. We're starting to move out the last of the original players and with so may young players in the team it probably isn't a surprise we were so inconsistent. We never looked in danger of going down, but in the same vein never looked like getting close to the playoffs either. When it became apparently we weren't going up or down I used the last 10 games to blood some younger players, especially in defence. Our results didn't suffer noticeably which was a positive, and although I'm not sure we'll go up next season I do have plenty of players in the team now with room to improve. One not so good piece of news is that Rakeem Thomas has decided to explore his options and won't be renewing his contract. We do have him for one more season but he will certainly be difficult to replace. His natural understudy has been out for 10 months this season with an ACL injury so it remains to be seen how he will return. I struggle with fitness in the early part of the season, with the relentless National League schedule meaning we play 8 league games in August and 9 in September, in fact this season by the time we had played 23 league games the Premier League had only played 9! We usually come on much stronger when we start to play once a week but that didn't happen as much this year. Cups We had a good run in the FA Cup, beating Wealdstone and Weymouth 6-0 and 3-0 respectively. I was rubbing my hands when we drew Dagenham & Redbridge in the second round as they were 20th in the National League at the time, with my dreaming of a big money spinning third round tie. Sadly despite having a full team out we didn't turn up at all and got soundly thumped 4-1 on our own patch. The real kicker was D&R going on to draw Wolves away in the third round and no doubt being far better off financially for the experience. We beat Truro City in the third round of the FA Trophy before our reserves lost 1-0 to Chester in round 4. Star Players Despite some of our issues this season we have never had problems scoring goals, and this is reflected by our three star players once again coming from the top of the pitch. Jamie McHardy 27b is now very much a main player for us in his second season since moving up from the u18s, scoring 23 goals and laying on 12 more in 34 starts. Portsmouth are interested in him and although not unsettled yet it is definitely a situation to keep an eye on. Against all the odds we managed to get Sam Caldwell 25b to sign a new 3 year deal with an extra year. I'd expected this to be his last season after he asked to leave but he came back to the negotiating table in August and I was more than happy to make him our highest earner to keep him at the club for 3 (+1) more seasons. He scored 28 goals in 42 appearances this season and in doing so became the first player to score 100 goals for the club so far in the challenge. Rakeem Thomas 25c is our highest rated player and will be a huge miss when he leaves in 12 months time. 18 goals in 34 starts is his best scoring return from the left wing and he now has over 200 appearances for the club. He also now has 15 goals in 35 caps for his country and I've no doubt there will be plenty of suitors when he departs at the end of next season. Youth Intake Although there are no top prospects I'm not actually that unhappy with this intake, especially considering the last few we've had. Stevie Crawford is a tough tackling full back and I expect he'll pick up quite a few cards considering he has 20 aggression. We haven't had a defender come through and make the starting 11 since our first intake in 2025 but I'm hoping he could finally be one to make the step up. Christopher Roberts isn't as good as the other forwards that have come through in the last few seasons, but I like his high work rate and attribute split. I may look to convert him to a left winger to fill the void that will be left by Thomas's impending departure. Admin No transfers out this season and only one loan. Jairo Pomares developed quite well on loan at Oxford City and will probably be pushing for a spot in the first team squad next season. I did release quite a bit of deadwood from the u18s this season who had reached an age where they didn't look like making it, but they don't show up on here for some reason. Last season's takeover coupled with a rise in attendances in the new stadium have kept us in the black, at least for the time being. Our average attendance of 4,817 was bettered only by Oldham and Gillingham and although the finances are on the slide due to the loan did keep us afloat financially. I pushed through another coaching badge early in the season so now have my continental B.

Dulwich Hamlet - 2028/29 Vanarama National League - 8th One point and one place higher than last season but that doesn't tell the whole story. After losing Panamarenko and Moro I feared the worst for this season but we went out like a house on fire and ended up second after the first 10 games. We then suffered through the heavy autumn schedule (9 league games in September!!) and slipped to upper mid table before resuming our charge up the league in early 2029. We floated between 5th and 8th but came up just short thanks to our cup exploits (more later). I feel a lot better about this season as unless my board get giddy and accept one of the many offers we're getting for Rekeem Thomas then we won't lose anyone for at least one more year. I'm hoping we can have another go at promotion next year and try and get into the league before the finances become a real issue. We were taken over half way through the season, sadly not by the tycoon who was rumoured to be circling but a consortium nonetheless. They cleared the debt and immediately approved junior coaching and youth recruitment upgrades, not a bad start from the new Mr Chairman. Cups After complaining last season that we hadn't won an FA Trophy game in the first four seasons of the save we went on a charge to the final, eventually coming up short in a crazy game against National League champions Crawley who beat us 8-5 after extra time! We had a favourable run of 5 home ties in a row, beating Woking, Hartlepool, Dorking and King's Lynn before thumping St Albans 5-0 in the semi final. Ironically finally having a good run probably killed our league chances as the fixtures started to mount up towards the end of the season and we ran out of steam. I forgot to screenshot the FA cup, but again we had a good run. We started off beating Hungerford 1-0 away before dismantling League One Mansfield 3-0 in the First Round proper. Our journey came to an end with a 4-1 defeat away at my hometown club Chesterfield who went on to be League Two champions. Star Players Following last season's departures of Moro and Panamarenko it was time for new heroes to comes to the fore from the academy and they certainly delivered. Sam Caldwell 25b took our main striking role and ended up not only our but the National League's top goalscorer, rattling in 35 goals and notching 16 assists in 49 games for a total of 51 goal involvements in 49 games. He's now decided he's too good for the club (he really is) but he is contracted for at least one more season so will spearhead next year's charge for the football league. Rakeem Thomas 25c is a familiar face on this list and again delivered a dependable 12 goals and 11 assists from 31 starts. He had quite a bad injury this year and spent a long time on international duty which hampered his contribution. He now has 25 caps for Antigua but didn't add to his 11 international goals this year. We have him for at least two more seasons due to an option clause but I spent most of the season rejecting bids of up to £1million from as high as Watford in the Championship. Our break out star this year was Jamie McHardy 27b, the first academy player to make a proper impact since the generational 2025 intake. He was given the daunting task of partnering Caldwell and at just 18 years old delivered a tremendous return of 29 goals in 43 starts. He still has plenty of growing room and I'm excited to see how far he can take us. Youth Intake This has been a source of concern for me in recent seasons and although there is slight improvement here I'd hoped for better after more upgrades. Also, are there no defenders in Dulwich or surrounding townships?!?! Jonathan Jewell is the standout here and with a good personality looks to be a natural successor if (when) Caldwell leaves us next summer. Although not as good as Jewell, Magnus Kellerman has moved straight into our first team squad as we are very short on defenders and he's already our third best centre half. I took a chance on quite a few of this intake simply because they're better than what I currently have in the u18s. Admin Quite a bit of excitement in the admin section this season! First up the club were taken over by a consortium who put in just under 400k to clear our debts and also upgraded our Junior Coaching and Youth Recruitment. After a bit of bartering they also agreed to another coaching badge so I'm now on the way to continental C. The is draining again but we got a bit of money from the FA Trophy final and I'll try and force through more upgrades as soon as they become available. The transfers section makes sad reading, confirming what I've mentioned a few times in this and previous posts. Moro also opted to leave England for Dundee, meaning I again got no compensation for overseeing the formative years of his career. Both had poor seasons, with Bas only scoring 2 goals for St Pats and Moro scoring no goals in 11 starts for Dundee. I do think we'd have got promoted if we'd managed to hold on to Moro but hopefully that will come next season.

There is such a big difference between 2 games per week Dulwich Hamlet.. And one game per week Dulwich Hamlet. Mansfield are in League One and we absolutely blew them away. Ebbsfleet are mid table but Crawley and Boston are 1st and 2nd. I know England brings the extra challenge of a gruelling schedule and lots of games but fatigue has a bigger impact than ever this year. Everything crossed for some strength in depth in this season's youth intake!

Next time you are having a tough time with this challenge, just remember you could be Cheltenham in my save. After being relegated from League One last season with only 14 points, 38 defeats and 124 goals conceded they were probably hoping for a better start in League Two... Where they are currently on course to conceded about 150 goals and have lost 12 from 13!

Dulwich Hamlet - 2027/28 Vanarama National League - 9th A very pleasing first outing at this level, with a 9th place finish probably about fair based on our performances. We spent the first third of the season between 14th-17th and although we never got sucked into the relegation battle I was a little bit nervous knowing a collapse in form could drag us in. The middle third we exploded into league winning form and we were as high at 5th after 33 games. We only won 4 of our last 12 as my squad ran out of steam and everyone around us seemed to win every week, however if I'd been offered 9th and 25 points above the relegation zone before a ball was kicked I'd have been more than happy. Our issue comes in two of our star players who have been part of the quarter to carry us over the last few seasons will be leaving on frees. Bas Panamarenko and our best player Paul Moro have both refused new contract and (unless there's a miracle with Moro) will be moving on to pastures new. Panamarenko is annoyingly going to St Pats, meaning we won't get any compensation as he is leaving England. Moro hasn't signed a pre contract yet but with 10 English clubs circling I would imagine as soon as they can make him an offer he'll be on his way. As seen further down we've had another shocking intake and I'm not really sure why, they've declined each year despite an improvement to facilities. As a result I've sacked my HoYD, brought in another and given responsibility for intakes to my Director of Football who due to my error assigning roles oversaw the 2025 golden generation which makes up most of my team. I've no idea if there's anything in the DoF doing it, but I'm a superstitious chap and with 5 over 30s in my best 11 we really are starting to run out of time. Our u18s won their league with 30 wins, 1 draw, 1 defeat and 153 goals scores, but that is more a reflection on them playing in a very poor league than there being any first team ready players coming through Cups The cups didn't go so well and we really needed them to. As a National League side we now enter the FA cup in the fourth qualifying round and were dumped out at home to National League South side Worthing. We also enter the Trophy in the third round, with defeat to Yeovil meaning we had no cup wins at all this season. We are now four seasons in and still haven't won an FA Trophy match! Star Players Star boy Paul Moro 25b took the step up to the National League with ease, registering 16 goals and 12 assists at an average rating of 7.31. He will leave us with 47 goals and 36 assists in just 121 games, a seriously impressive return from attacking midfield. He's one of my favourite players over the last couple of versions of FM and is going to leave an enormous void that I'm not currently equipped to fill. One player who will be staying with us is Rekeem Thomas 25c. I offered him a 3+1 contract and the next day before signing he said he wanted to explore his options and leave. Luckily the contract offer seemed to supersede his unhappiness and he signed the contract. He gave us 10 goals and 9 assists in 31 starts, his season often broken up by international duty. He is a real star for Antigua though, with 10 goals in 17 caps for his nation. After Panamarenko signed his pre contract deal with St Pats, I decided to switch to 1 up front and go all in on Sam Caldwell 25b, benching our departing Irishman. He didn't let me down and despite not being the fastest scored 18 goals in 35 starts. 15 finishing and composure is elite for this level and keeping him supplied with chances will be crucial to surviving next season. I do have another similar striker in the academy from last year's intake, McHardy, who scored an incredible 46 in 38 for the U18s so there is every chance I may switch back to a front two going forward. Youth Intake As mentioned further up another really disappointing intake, meaning the squad situation is becoming quite desperate which original players aging fast. I signed 7 players from this intake, just to make the numbers up in the u18s if nothing else. Danny Atkinson seems to have the highest potential but has a very odd set of attributes for an attacking midfielder, I haven't quite decided what to do with him yet. I'm hoping my superstitious switch back to my DoF handling next year's intake bears the same fruit as it did in 2025 as the last 3 intakes have really dwindled to nothing. Admin The board's decision to take out a huge loan for a new 6000 seater stadium proved every bit as disastrous as expected, with the monthly repayments undoing all my previous good financial management and pushing us into the red for the first time. The stadium opens in 2 weeks, but the predicted increase in income doesn't cover the £50k monthly repayments. Obviously without a cup run facility improvements aren't on the horizon, however with good youth coaching and average youth recruitment (and being London based) I would really expect to see better intakes than we are currently. No transfers out to show but this will obviously change when my two top prospects depart. Moro I have already covered, and Panamarenko leaves us after scoring 47 times in 118 starts. Between the pair the have scored almost 100 goals and laid on 50 more in 3 seasons, and we will really need Caldwell and Beaney to step up going into next season.

Couldn't get him to sign a new deal and he'll leave us on a free at the end of the season. Had banked on a bit of compensation but as he's moving to Ireland we won't get a penny.

I would say only one is fit to play that role, he was initially a centre midfielder that I retrained to fill the gap as he's a big, brave lad who can also play a bit. The honest reason I play BPDs is that they just seem to perform better on FM's match engine. The BPD role by design makes centre backs play more direct passes which my tactic relies on, so in a sense 'ball playing defender' is a bit misleading as it feels as though they should play short intricate patterns like Man City but often gets them looking for a longer pass.

Annoyingly about 20 minutes after I posted my update last night both Moro and Panamarenko decided they were too good (probably rightly so) for the club and wanted to leave! I managed to agree I'd sell them if a certain fee was reached which I'm hoping is unrealistic for the type of League Two and other National League clubs that are interested and in doing so I don't seem to have affected their morale. I'm not a master tactician by any stretch, but I set up in a 3-4-1-2 which stems from years of watching Chris Wilder's Sheffield United home and away as we went from the bottom of League One to 4th in the Premier League when football paused for the pandemic. I tinkered with the overlapping centre backs but couldn't get that working, but the overall idea is to create overloads down the left and right and getting crosses in to my star strikers. The other telling thing from the screenshot is that only 3 academy players are in my best starting 11, something I really need to change quite quickly!

Right on cue! I'm not keen on the £3.5 million loan for a 6,300 seater stadium, but I suppose it is more than double our current capacity and may be worth it if we can fill it.