[FM10] Who the bleeping hell are we?

[Yid Army]

Set up

This career is played on Football Manager 10, patch 10.3 and database 10.3. Two editor files are loaded - Superbladesman's English lower league file, full version - down to level 10 - and CymruAmBythWXM's Welsh lower league file. I have edited both of these slightly - the English one to make sure each level has a higher reputation than the one before, and the Welsh one to make the Welsh clubs playing in England have Welsh nationality, meaning they qualify for Europe if they win the new Welsh Cup they are included in. I have loaded England down to level 10, and the top leagues from Scotland and Wales on view only (on a hunch that it improves the regionalism of the English leagues) and a small database. I only loaded the Welsh file as I wanted to experiment with how the games handles a lower league side in Europe and figured I may as well do it on this game as I am loading Wales anyway, and didn't want the level eleven file for England due to it's lack of regional cups as of the latest (and possibly final) build.

Introduction

I found out that level 10 clubs from London, where I wished to start, play in the Combined Counties league division one, so I went in their and used a random number generator to see who I should be - I first got Staines Lammas from, you guessed it, Staines, but I then got Feltham, from the far western side of London, and so my career began.

July 2009 - Feltham - Combined Counties League Division One

My board set the following expectations for this season:

• Top half of the league
  
• Enjoy the F.A. Cup (even I might manage that one!)
  
• Second Qualifying round in the F.A. Vase
  
• Second Round of the Combined Counties Premier Cup
  
• And finally, the semi-final of the Combined Counties Division One Cup
  

To start with, I sacked all of the clubs employees as they were all useless even for this level, and bought in my own squad and back room staff. Most of these were newgens or unknowns, but I will run through the more well-known of them:

• Rob Gier, a right back who played for Wimbledon in the Championship and has three caps for the Phillippines. Was in the Blue Square Premier last season with Grays and is still only 28.
  
• My only other foreigner, Mark Jones from Barbados, but still uncapped.
  
• Marcus Jones, a 35 year old who has not played since 2002. Has had spells in the Blue Square Premier with Telford and Scarborough, as well as two league two matches for Cheltenham
  
• And Neil Fitzhenry as physio, a former Wigan player in their League One days.
  

I feel I now have a much more capable team, ready to start their season off next month.

Tactics

I have decided that due to the quality of players I am working with (dreadful), I am going to play and extremely basic 4-4-2. I have the following roles:

Goalkeeper

Fall Back

Centre Back Centre Back

Fall Back

Wide Midfielder

Central Midfielder Central Midfielder

Wide Midfielder

Complete Forward Complete Forward

(note that is meant to be just three lines of players but my tags are messing around)

All defender's are on the defend role, midfielder's support and striker's attack. I have a very rigid philosophy, Man Marking with little creative freedom and roaming and a mentality I will adjust depending on opposition and match situation.

[Yid Army]

August 2009 - Feltham - Combined Counties League Division One

Note all matches in this and future updates are League unless stated otherwise.

12/08/09 - Feltham 1-0 Frimley Green

A solid yet unspectacular start to the season, with Richard Cook scoring the only goal in the 33rd minute, shooting from inside the box after a low corner to him from Mick Hanley. This goal gave him a club record of youngest goal scorer at age 16 years and 157 days. Ahmet Sonmez also became our youngest player at 16 years and 13 days.

15/08/09 - Worthing Utd 1-1 Feltham - F.A. Cup extra preliminary round

The bookies had Worthing down as strong favourites despite playing in the same tier as me and we soon saw why as Phil Lindegard went through on goal and scored the opener for them after just two minutes. Worthing then had two more clear cut chances before a huge free kick from goalkeeper Devonshire just outside his own box fell onto the head of striker Nick Corbell on the edge on the D, whose looping head left the goalkeeper stranded in the middle of his box as the ball floated into the corner - an equaliser from nothing. We were continually bombarded for the rest of the match and Worthing hit the woodwork late on, but we hung on to somehow clinch a replay.

18/08/09 - Feltham 1-2 Worthing Utd A.E.T. - F.A. Cup extra preliminary round replay

This game started just the same as the previous one, with us coming under extensive pressure, and Worthing took the lead after 33 minutes when a cross found Brian Myers unmarked at the back post with an easy header, although he was a good three yards offside. Worthing continued to dominate until the hour mark, but we then came into the game and put some pressure on ourselves, with a Corbell header hitting the crossbar. We got the equaliser five minutes from time, with a smart pass from Sonmez finding Mills in the box, who turned his defender and shot into the top-left hand corner. The game was even throughout extra time, but my exhausted team couldn't quite hang on and two minutes from time, Worthing scored another offside goal Lindegaard scoring the one-on-one. We nearly pulled off a remarkable comeback in injury time, but Sonmez's long-range effort was superbly pushed out for a corner which there was no time to take. It was gut-wrenching to go out to two offside goals after such an admirable determination was shown, but that is the way it is in football as we go out of a cup that, in all honesty, we never expected anything from anyway. Just to make matters worse, after the game we found out that left-back Geoff Tayler, who had come off injured during the match, would be out for around two months.

UPDATE TO BE CONTINUED - WATCH THIS SPACE!!!