Wandering to Glory

[wynter]

Smoke fills the dark room. In it he sits, wincing at the fumes that emanate from the cigar. The man in front of him is shrouded by shadows. 

"So we are in agreement, yes?" The man asks him, the end of the cigar flaring threateningly.

"Sure mate." Price says as he takes a swig of the bottle. "Just keep this topped up and we've got no worries."

He can't see his face but he's sure the man is leering at him. 

"I see." Is all the man says after a short pause. Welcome aboard Mr. Price." 

Price goes to shake his hand but he doesn't get the chance. Two sets of hands grip him by the arms and drag him out of the office. The door slams shut behind them.

Could be worse. Price thinks to himself as he's led away. Free accommodation and money every time I win, what's there to lose? 

On the last possible day, Bolton Wanderers were saved by a takeover from an unnamed businessman, in the final seconds of Deadline Day 9 players were acquired but in all the panic they forgot one very important detail. 

Who would manage them?

On the streets outside the Macron Stadium a drunk former footballer woke up, little did he know that his mere presence would lead to a destiny, a long and winding road where glory or failure loomed in the distance. At the very least, they would remember his name...

Had an idea for a save, but couldn't be bothered waiting a month to start it, so the idea of a hybrid will be crossed when it comes to it haha. Leagues and Player Changes made using the live update file on Sortitoutsi, Bury is still in this one though since I got it right before they were removed from the League. First step is survival and from there returning to the Premier League and then we'll go from there. Hope you enjoy!

[Nobby_McDonald]

Good luck staying up.

[Nobby_McDonald]

Oh and I see you've tagged it as a FM19/20 hybrid. How is that going to work?

[wynter]

7 hours ago, Nobby_McDonald said:

Oh and I see you've tagged it as a FM19/20 hybrid. How is that going to work?

Plan so far is being a Journeyman, I'll finish at Bolton and move onto a different side in FM20  so it'll be as seamless a transition as possible. We'll see what happens though  

7 hours ago, Nobby_McDonald said:

Good luck staying up.

And yes, ready the sacrifices. 

[wynter]

"Football, should be uncomplicated." Price told the assembled coaches in front of him, staggering slightly against the board. His pen drew a line right through the formation and with a furrowed brow he wiped away the mess, taking out half the little dots he'd so carefully drawn over the past hour with him. 

"And what do we mean by uncomplicated?"

A blinking hive of nothing stared back at him. 

"GOALS YOU CRETINS! GOALS, GOALS AND...?"

"GOALS!" They bellowed back.

"Excellent lads."

Formations

 

A more relaxed, pump it into the box style 4-2-4 vs a high pressing 4-3-3. Look for these to be our main systems over the coming months. They're also very basic which fits where we are right now.

A whole new squad meant a whole batch of Friendly games to get my systems running and to slowly whittle away at our abhorrent cohesiveness.

Which has led to a... Mixed Start. On the plus-side we're scoring and games have been tight. Hopefully into Positive points by October. Rochdale was the obvious highlight. Daryl Murphy just absolutely demolished them, not bad for a 36 year old I thought was awful when he was at the toon hahaha.

Edited October 15, 2019 by wynter

[ManUtd1]

These formations are not what i was expecting... 

Followed!

Edited October 17, 2019 by ManUtd1

[wynter]

5 minutes ago, ManUtd1 said:

These formations are not what i was expecting... 

Followed!

My dreams of implementing a 1-1-8 with a highly aggressive sweeper keeper are still under development 

Edit: Missing my assymetrics though... Later, when I've lost my mind sufficiently...

Edited October 17, 2019 by wynter

[wynter]

"Have you ever heard of Rollout? I thought not, it's not a move Pokemon Trainers would teach you..."

Inch by Inch... Build the Momentum. Soon we'll be bowl our way through the opposition.

There are games where we just explode with goals. Upping the frequency of those games. That's the struggle.

Into positive points and with the 2nd highest Goal Tally in the league. We'd only be firmly mid-table though if we weren't 12 points behind so there's room for improvement lurking ominously in the distance.

Edited October 17, 2019 by wynter

[Northernpilgrim]

But for the points deduction, you'd be four points behind the last team in the playoffs.  Survival would be a hell of an achievement in these circumstances.  Great start.

[wynter]

29 minutes ago, Northernpilgrim said:

But for the points deduction, you'd be four points behind the last team in the playoffs.  Survival would be a hell of an achievement in these circumstances.  Great start.

True, Murphy, Verlinden and Lowe for example are all Championship Quality though and described as such in reports. So it's a stupidly strong side they pulled together/I've got to work with. 

Happy with how it's going but, won't lie 

[wynter]

He walks into the Office, noting idly the harried glances his way from a flurry of businessmen and suits who he had no idea were going to be at the Club today.

With that he walks into the Chairman's Room. He hadn't been called here since the first day, when he'd been found on the streets outside and given a shot at glory.

"What did you want boss?"

The meeting is quick, brief and he's almost already on his way out before he even sits down.

"Finances Cleared."

Finally back to buying and selling players. Local businessman came in and cleared out debts, or rather took out more loans and we're back to repaying them on a monthly basis. The 12mil investment into the club was nice but expecting to lose 7mil this year we're probably dropping into the Red again in 1-2 seasons.

Bit of a disappointing month truth be told. We've only really closed the gap by a point between us and the rest of the league. In terms of transfers now we're able to do some work I'm going to be looking at strenghtening a few positions with some loans and adding depth. Namely left back and right back need cover/competition and the Centre Back pairing needs improvement. Stacking our defence to allow us to go forward while conceding less will be a big advantage moving into the 2nd half of the season. In the midfield, a nice B2B option to provide some competition to our established stars will be handy.

In great news... At least we beat Sunderland 

[Nobby_McDonald]

On 15/10/2019 at 04:58, wynter said:

Plan so far is being a Journeyman, I'll finish at Bolton and move onto a different side in FM20  so it'll be as seamless a transition as possible. We'll see what happens though

Unless I've missed something massive, you can't transfer saves from FM19 to FM20, so how will this work?

[wynter]

1 hour ago, Nobby_McDonald said:

Unless I've missed something massive, you can't transfer saves from FM19 to FM20, so how will this work?

Probably just Sim a game to the date I leave this one, add a manager and pretend that he was at Bolton 👐

[Nobby_McDonald]

So it is a different game world and not a hybrid.

[wynter]

Hybrid in that both 19 and 20 are being played. Unfortunately new game world but I'm fine with that 

[andychar]

I did exactly the same thing last year. Had a save on 18 and got a new job just as 19 came out. So I marked down my managerial stats and badges on 18 and recreated them on 19. Obviously depending on how far you go you'll potentially be repeating a season or 2 but I thought it worked out quite well. 

Obviously the draw back will be what happens if you get promoted/relegated and the points deduction. I assume you will be waiting till full release and trying to mirror what happens in your 19 save as best as physically possible.

 

[wynter]

November 2018

I don't even know who Bromley are... But they've just made a list...

Otherwise a good month with 7/12 points acquired.

Quick team talk after the Lincoln Loss has given us a bout of confidence. Just need to get through the next month and we're in prime position to launch a bid for mid-table safety. Hell 9th/10th aren't that far away with 26 Games to go. One team overtaken in Rochdale is also a massive boost.

Edited October 24, 2019 by wynter

[wynter]

December

One more result and we're out of the Bottom Four. Mixed month, only losing one and that loss was to Play-Off bound Ipswich no less, but two draws were costly points and 17th and 19th are below our standard. 2 very winnable matches turned frustrating.

[wynter]

January 2019

Weird January... We've had basically an identical patch of results but somehow everyone else has been even less impressive than us. It leaves us 5 points off 14th and 10 from 9th with 15 games left and to add to our form.. We've made some great additions

Eric Garcia

Ryan Yates

Mads Bech

Garcia creates a BPD to help us retain possession, Yates is an improvement over our BBM/RPM in our 4-2-4 creating a more dynamic midfield and Bech adds a dimension to the left side of the field. All of these should add more to our attack and ball-retention while Beck and Garcia will also add steel with their presence. We've hopefully killed two birds with one stone, improvements to defence and added attacking threat.

[wynter]

February

Excellent month, Rotherham are due for relegation which makes the draw a minor rankle, but Oxford are first in the league and we utterly manhandled them. Meanwhile we squeaked past Sunderland again and my innate Toon Worshipper feels satisfied.

Into Mid-Table mediocrity we go.

[wynter]

"How is this office so dark?" 

 

"Mr. Price-"

 

"No seriously." Price says as he stands up and feels his way around the room. "Did you buy some custom curtains and order them to consume all light in the universe? Who even makes these, and what's their number?" 

 

A series of papers fly into his face, how the man aimed them so precisely in the darkness is amazing. 

 

"Ever thought about showing the boys how to aim throw-ins?"

 

"Sit."

 

Begrudgingly, Price sits down. A light shines overhead and with this newfound illumination he glances at the documents in front of him.

 

"What am I looking at?"

 

"You know, the day you were dragged into this office, I just figured you'd make a nice figurehead. You'd give me a couple of months where I could shop around for a better manager, sack you when you inevitably failed and then bankroll this club to safety in the January window." 

 

His boss angrily stubs his cigar into the ash tray, as if admitting it is a painful endeavour.

 

"Unfortunately, your impressive performances have led to a re-evaluation of your abilities and now I have had to decide… Do I get rid of you anyway… Or do I back you to bring us to Glory?" 

 

A scarred hand reaches forward and flips the first page.

 

Price holds his breath...

 

"You'll find a 4 year contract in those papers, feel free to go over them with your lawyer if you have one. A nice pay rise and some minor investments on our part to keep your attention." 

It all sounds good...

"What do you mean Minor investments?" 

[Nobby_McDonald]

On 22/10/2019 at 14:12, wynter said:

November 2018

I don't even know who Bromley are... But they've just made a list...

 

Bromley are the current leaders of the National League in real life.