FMHi11: Frog's back and he's gone mobile!

[FrogMan]

Okay, I've done some reporting of my career in FM Handheld for iDevice (iPod Touch in my case) in the game's thread on the general forum but I figured I needed a more localized spot to rant, vent, cry for joy or simply cry. See, as I've always done, I started my career as a manager at Luton Town, now playing in the Blue Square Bet Premiere Conference. The board is expecting us to mount a serious challenge to win the league title but we've had a kind of rough start to the season. After 11 matches, we were sitting in the bottom half of the table with a record of only 3 wins, 4 draws and 4 losses. Things have rebounded in the last 5 matches where we have gone on a sort of scoring spree. During that 5 match run, we've won three (5-0, 4-2, 4-0), have drawn one 4-4 but the one kicker is our last loss, to then 2nd place Rushden, 3-4 on an 89th minute goal, after being ahead by a couple goals early in the game.

Following that loss, I've seen that I'm now the only one listed with an insecure job. Woah, 16 games in, this could be my shortest stint of all time!

Okay, enough drama. I think (hope!) I can turn things around. I've brought in some new players and if the squad can only gel a little, as they seem to show they are doing now by scoring boat loads of goals, we should be fine.

Same disclaimer as always, I don't know how often I'll update here. I want a spot where I can talk about the squad, its ups and downs, and about the game too. Don't think I've seen a dynasty about the handheld version of the game, although I must say it's been a long while since I've visited in here.

I plan on using the ease of taking screenshots to report, so here are a few in attachments to help you follow who's who.

The date is October 23, 2010 and our next match is an FA Cup 4th round qualifying match, away at Havant & Waterlooville, a Blue Square South side.

We usually play a 4-4-2 diamond formation and I tweak between attacking and balanced depending if we're at home or away.

Three of our four free transfers are regular starters for us. Jeffers has been hurt for about a month but will go right back to his spot at SC once he's ready. Walker can be great in goal but he's also been prone to collapsing late in games. I've had a little talk with him, in private, where I criticised his play in our latest match (the 3-4 loss to Rushden). My assistant is telling me he reacted positively to it. We'll see. Hughes is just the quarterback I needed in the DMC spot. Smart is a solid backup that has seen spot duty as a starter.

Of the two loaners, Vallés has been hurt but was having a monster year before that. He just got back in the lineup and I expect him to push us forward a lot. Bowman as stepped in as a replacement for Jeffers at SC and will serve a backup role when he comes back.

Here goes nothing, I'll be back later to talk to myself some more. :)

FM

[FrogMan]

October 23, 2010
Gah, played H & W to a scoreless draw. Frustrating is the fact that we couldn't put one of our 7 shots on target, after scoring at will for five matches, but we also lost two players for our replay in a few days. Winger Andy Drury twisted his knee and will miss two weeks while DC Besta is suspended for a match with too many yellow cards.

All in all, we probably should have won, as we dominated in most aspects, we just couldn't pull it off away from home. Hopefully playing back home in the replay will give us the push we need...

FM

[FrogMan]

October 27, 2010
Okay, that was more like it. Up 1-0 after only 2 minutes, 4-0 atfer 26, we're on our way to win the replay easily, 5-0. We put 8 of our 10 shots on target in that game and win possession 55-45. Adam Murray who was growing frustrated of not playing with the first team a brace scores two and George Pilkington, who was also pissed at not starting, does well in the DC spot.

I did comment negatively in public toward striker Taiwo Atieno. He'd had games rated at 9 for 4 games and dipped to a 7 in our 0-0 draw. It probably paid off as he was the one to score our first goal after only 2 minutes of play.

Claude Gnakpa, who feels like an old blanket to me now in the sense that he's always been a Hatter for all the career's I've started over the years, going back to FM2005, got the Man of the Match with a rating of 10.

This win has had a very positive boost to overall club morale. Hopefully it'll help us in league play. That's something we've had trouble getting up, our morale.

FM

[FrogMan]

October 30, 2010
We beat 16th place Fleetwood convincingly, 3-1. AMC Adam Murray continues his excellent play, getting a second 10 rated game in a row and the MoM. We pu 9 of 15 shots on target. We now have the 4th best run of form in the league for the last 6 matches.

November 2, 2010
I was the runner-up for best manager in the Blue Square Premier in October and my job is not insecure anymore.

The board now feel I should be performing slightly better but they say our recent form gives them a glimmer of hope. Let's up we can keep it up...

Huhoh, Enric Vallés' loan contract ends and he returns to Birmingham. He really helped us early on at the left wing spot before getting injured and missing 3 weeks. I usually don't do 3 months loans. Guess I was desperate in that case. We'll have make do as we did when he was injured. Birmingham have rejected a request to reloan the player.

November 6, 2010
We beat Gateshead 2-0 in a match of the 1st round of the FA Cup. They're also a Blue Square Premier side. We put 6 of our shots on target and would have scored more if not for their keeper's MoM performance.

November 9, 2010
We play 3rd place Crawley to a 3-3 draw after being ahead 3-1 after 52 minutes. This is frustrating since we were 7 points behind them before the match, despite us sitting in a lowly 10th place on the table. We controlled possession but I've yet to find the right tactic to end games correctly. Bally Smart played in Vallés' left wing spot and got rated at 10 for his performance. Old man Kevin Gallen started for tired Adam Murray in the AMC spot and scored a couple.

FM

[FrogMan]

November 20, 2010
We play 10th place Cambridge at home as we've had the habit of doing lately, we jump to a 1-0 lead only 2 minutes into the game. They tie the game 2-2 just as the second half starts but we regain the lead in the 71st minute. Still looking for a way for us not to bleed away a lead, I try a 5-3-2 defensive formation that you can see in the attachment, bringing in veteran George Pilkington as a third centreback. We really controlled the game from that moment on and even added a fourth goal to win the game 4-2. Their keeper had a 4 rated match while Andy Murray records his 3rd 10 rated match in his last 5 appearances, collecting his second MoM in the sequence.

We're now the ones sitting in 10th place after that win, still not so great but we're now only 4 points from the playoffs line.

New twist on the confidence report. The board still think I should be performing slightly better but they also add that they are monitoring the mood amongst the players in the squad.

Hrm, let's boost them up a bit, I give a positive talk to the media about Andy Murray. Three 10 rated matches in the last five sure deserve a bit of praise. The day after, my assistant reports that Murray appeared especially motivated during the morning's training session. Good! :)

Next up, a quick roundup of the squad, position by position.

FM

[FrogMan]

The squad is attached below, as they were selected for our last match.

The Keepers
37yo Jimmy Walker is our starter for the time being. As I said before, he can do greay and not so great things, sometimes in the span of a few minutes. He'll have to do for now as Mark Tyler really wasn't up for the task before Walker joined the team.

The Defenders
Jake Howells started as our left fullback and that kinda angered Fred Murray a bit until I gave him a chance. Murray's been much more solid but is not a long term solution there.

Keith Keane is our current right fullback but can play many positions (DMC and MR). He was our starter at DMC before Hughes was acquired. Claude Gnakpa and Ed Asafu Adjaye could play that spot too but Keane is a great playmaker from the back.

Pavel Besta and Zdenek Kroca are two very good centrebacks for our level of play. Surprisingly enough, Kroca is lethal with his headers from corners, showing with 5 goals already on the season. George Pilkington is our main backup at the position.

The Midfielders
Stephen Hughes is not a pure DMC per se but he is our best center midfielder by a long shot. He's done REALLY well for us since joing the thing a little after the start of the season. Keith Keane could play there as could also Godrey Poku but he's very fringe and has yet to record an appearance this season.

At the AMC spot, I've gone with a sort of rotation between Adam Murray, Kevin Gallen and even Andy Drury at times. While Murray is very hot at the moment, Gallen has had some moments of brilliance too.

On the outside, Claude Gnakpa is not a real pure winger but he is infatigable and so allows me to make other subs as the game winds down. He's also been very steady in his form since I've put him to work on the wing from the early fullback position I had him playing in. On the left, as I said, we had Enric Vallés for a while but Andy Drury has played really well there too. Bally Smart is rounding up a good trio of wingers. I might like some more depth there as I'm not too sure Adam Newton would cut it over a long period of time. Kevin Gallen can play the wing too but he's slow as a turtle (pace=4) and tires simply at looking a the grass between him and the backline (stamina=4) so I will only use him for spot duty there.

The Strikers
Francis Jeffers was brought in as a possible goal supplier for our offense but when he went down with injury, it's little known Taiwo Atieno who stepped up. He's been huge for us and stands in the top 8 in the league for average rating. Ryan Bowman is a loanee and while he can find the back of the net, he also takes whole games off. Sort of the same can be said for Danny Crow. One I had kind of dismissed but that has great shooting and pace is Matthew Barnes-Homer. My keeping him out of the lineup has made him pissed off and he's requested to be transfer listed, a request that I accepted although I will probably give him a bit more playing time in the coming weeks.

There they are, your 2010 Hatters! :)

FM

[Marc Vaughan]

Fantastic stuff - really enjoying it and its interesting seeing how someone plays the game ... (always fascinated to get an inside track on someone playing one of my games :D).

[FrogMan]

cool, an MV sighting! Welcome aboard, hope you enjoy the ride. :)

So far, I really like the game. Simpler, not as tough on my obsessive-compulsive self, yet just as immersive, at least in my opinion. I can play it sitting on my very comfortable couch and yet I still pump my fist in the air when we score. Gotta keep my cursing between my teeth though. Don't want the lady shooting too many of these "eyes as daggers" kind of looks. :)

FM

[FrogMan]

November 27, 2010
FA Cup 1st round, we play Rushden. It's kind of a lucky draw as there are very few Conference sides left and more and more League 1 and 2 entering the draw.

Really rough start as we go down 0-2 after 30 minutes. We claw one back and it's 1-2 at the half. GK Walker and DL are having a rough match at that point, both of them rating at 5.

Second half is much better and we tie the game at 2 a piece right after the break and we hold on for the draw. Kinda disappointing that we again couldn't put them away.

Claude Gnakpa got the MoM with the equalizer and a match rating of 9.

Prior to the match, George Pilkington requested to be transfer listed, saying he had been unfairly left out of the starting lineup. I reject his request. He's my main backup at the centreback spot.

One thing's interesting, the game must not think I have brought enough players as my "transfer acumen" rating has dipped one point, from 10 to 9. The team board seems okay with the transfers I've done though, as their confidence in that matter sits right at about the 50% mark.

FM

[bbgunn]

First, just wanna say that I enjoy your work FgM, past and present.

How does viewing a game work in FM Handheld? 2D? Or just commentary?

[FrogMan]

First, just wanna say that I enjoy your work FgM, past and present.

How does viewing a game work in FM Handheld? 2D? Or just commentary?

first off, thanks. :) Nice to see people from the old times.

Viewing games is commentary with highlights in 2D although you can choose to go with commentary only. For the 2D, you have the choice between full pitch where you see the whole pitch (duh) horizontally and zoomed in where you see only one end of the field, vertically. I'll take a couple screenshots when I'll play ou next game later on.

FM

[bbgunn]

first off, thanks. :) Nice to see people from the old times.

Viewing games is commentary with highlights in 2D although you can choose to go with commentary only. For the 2D, you have the choice between full pitch where you see the whole pitch (duh) horizontally and zoomed in where you see only one end of the field, vertically. I'll take a couple screenshots when I'll play ou next game later on.

FM
Excellent, thanks for the reply!

[FrogMan]

November 30, 2010
We play 15th place Barrow at home. I give the start at striker to Matthew Barnes-Homer, hoping his blaxing speed will spark something in our attack. We dominate possession for most of the game but just can't get away from them. We finally get a 2-1 lead in the 83rd minute and I pull the guys back to our defensive 5-3-2 formation only to see our opponents put one back in. Final score: 2-2.

Gah, 57% possession, we outshot them 10-5 (but only 4-3 on target) yet we couldn't put the game away, even on our home pitch. Adam Drury got another MoM.

You can see a couple screenshots of how the 2D matche engine looks in the handheld version of FM. As much as they look to be about the same sequence, they are from two different corner, as you can see from the minute count inbetween the team scores. :) The screenshot taking process does had some jaggedness so it doesn't look as bad in game. I used to play in zoomed pitch but have reverted back to the full pitch setting as I felt it gives me a better overall feel as to how the whole team is playing.

December 1, 2010
Hrm, the board is still disappointed with my management of the team and they keep monitoring the mood amongst the players of the squad.

December 4, 2010
Oh crap, as I head to the stadium for our FA Cup replay against Rushden, I read that a rumour has surfaced that the Luton Town team board are shortlisting managers as possible replacements. :(

To help make things better (not!) goalkeeper Jimmy Walker bruises his head in training and will miss a week. Looks like Mark Tyler will have to play a bit...

Trying to jig things up, I interact with a couple players. I have private talks with Jeffers and Keane while I publicly criticizes Striker Taiwo Atieno for his lack of production in the last couple weeks.

The match is a tough one which we do win, 2-1. Got the feeling we got dominated and shouldn't have won it to be honest. They outshot us 10-9 (7-4 on target) but it looked worse in game. Atieno did respond well to the criticism, scoring the winning goal late in the game and getting the MoM. We will play League One Southampton in the 3rd round.

December 5, 2010
Well, Atieno might have played well yesterday but my assistant reports that while he reported for this morning's training session, he was rather lax in his commitment during the session.

FM

[FrogMan]

December 8, 2010
We play 7th place Darlington. We are currently in 12th place but still only 5 points from 5th place, the last spot to be in the playoffs.

We've played a lot of football recently and I decide to give a break to 34yo Stephen Hughes. Keane takes his DMC spot, Gnakpa goes to DRC and Bally Smart will start at the right winger spot.

We're down 0-1 at the half when the fit hits the shan and Claude Gnakpa gets red carded for a professional in our penalty area. Not only we'll have to finish the game one man short but we go down 0-2 on the ensuing penalty kick. When keeper Mark Tyler lets a third goal in on the 84th minute, I've had enough and I put in Jimmy Walker for the last 6 minutes, bruised head and all.

Oh sure, he had to go and bang his head on the goalpost or something and we finish the game without a keeper and with only 9 players on the pitch. Ugh. :banghead:

Following the game I learn that Claude Gnakpa has been banned for one domestic match and I decide to appeal the ban. To my great surprise, the appeals panel tell me that after review of the video footage of the incident and upon reflection, they have decided to repeal the ban. Wow, it's the first time I think this has ever happened in all my FM careers...

FM

[FrogMan]

December 11, 2010
Something seems odd in the game following my latest click of the "continue" button. Then it registers, the screen header is not orange anymore but a generic blue, then it hits me, like a 2x4 to the side of the head: Luton manager Steve Gougeon sacked!

Pardon my French but, oh shit! :( They say that it's due to the club's poor league position, and I kinda, sorta can understand their position. Luton Town have had a long history and were used to play in a much higher league than at the conference level. I guess they were really serious about expecting the team to mount a push for the league title. I would only have hoped to at least make it to the January transfer window.

For a moment, I'm devastated, then I go, oh well, life goes on, to the unemployement office we go... Other than the Luton job, there are two other openings in England (not knowing how fast the game would process, I started this game with only England as active league, from Blue Square Premier and up). One is Aston Villa in the Premier League, yeah right. The other is at Mansfield Town, another Blue Square Premier side. This one is interesting as they sit in 4th place and currently have the 5th best run of forms in the league over the last 6 matches. I wonder what their expectations were for them to sack their manager. Or maybe he bailed on them for higher grounds. I can't find anything in the news items I have.

I'll ponder this for a couple days (in game, don't worry) and we'll see...

FM

[FrogMan]

December 14, 2010
I applied for the Mansfield job the very next day and a couple days later, they called me back to offer me the job. I'm the new manager at Mansfield Town!

The Mansfield Town directors tell me they expect the club to attain a respectable league position this season. We're alread well placed, in 4th place. Hopefully I won't throw this all down and we can build from there, make the playoffs and put together a strong push for promotion next season. They say they have allocated a small transfer budget to help me and small it is. $10k is what I've working with. What will probably restricts me more is the wage budget of only $25,459 per week. Their current wage total sits at $17,803 per week, so about $7,500 to work with. With their max wage currently at $2,400, this means about three new players of higher caliber, for the team at least. This budget is less than half what I had to work with at Luton, where the weekly wage budget was at $54,000.

Lots to do when you take over a new club, not the least of which is evaluating the talent in place. I've attached the current squad as selected for their last match as well as my assistant's team report. My assistant is right in that I'd like to bring in a new keeper, but experience is not the problem here. The current keeper is 31yo, he simply sucks. Also, when Gary Silk is identified as your strongest defender, you might be in trouble (see attached player card). Kyle Nix looks like a good midfielder although I can't understand why he was left out of selection for the last match. Also, only based on ratings, they seem to have a strong pair of wingers. Their training sucks, seriously, all red down arrows everywher with everyone going on the generic "general" training. I'll assign everyone to the right position based training regimen and we'll start from there.

I don't know up front what kind of formation we might play although I always like the 442 diamond. Will have to see if we got the personnel to pull it off...

First match will be an FA Trophy 1st round replay, away at Blue Square South side Maidenhead. They drew 0-0 in the first match.

FM

[bbgunn]

Whoa. Sorry you got sacked there, FgM. Those Luton Town fatcats should have been more patient!

Thanks for the pitch screenshots, by the way.

[NoSkillz]

Awesome! Another FM/FM dynasty! :)

[FrogMan]

Awesome! Another FM/FM dynasty! :)

I almost posted an invitation to your Facebook page but thought people would think I'm a bit crazy ;)

FM

[FrogMan]

December 15, 2010
We play Blue Square South side Maidenhead United away on an FA Trophy replay. Looking at the team, what I thought were good wingers seems more like a good bunch of midfielder because while they are often marked with AM R or AM RL position descriptions, these guys all have stamina in the 5-6 range. Never seen so many guys with so low stamina, it's incredible.

With that in mind, I decide to try a 4-1-3-2 formation that will have three centre midfielders and no wingers per se. It's the first time I try to kind of thing and I usually like having wingers, but I gotta go with what we have and that setup will give a bit of backup to our defenders who, quite frankly, don't impress me much.

I've been shopping for a replacement to current keeper Alan Marriott but they're not easy to find. I at least try to boost his morale by giving him a positive pep talk prior to the game.

Marriott plays a solid game, getting our only rating of 8, but we drop the game, 0-1. We struggle to maintain possession and never really put any pressure on their defenders. A work in progress I'd call it. I'm kinda disappointed that two of the three players presented by my assistant as our strongest in one area both got ratings of 5 for this game. Come on guys, I want us to succeed but you gotta help me out here!

FM

[FrogMan]

December 18, 2010
We play 14th place Barrow on their pitch. We're currently in 4th place ourselves. I keep the 4-1-3-2 formation, hoping the guys will get accustomed to it. I'm kinda shocked to see so many guys going into the game with conditions in the hig 80's/low 90's. Used to see conditions areound 95 for about everyone at Luton, and even more so for defenders. Our left back, Kevin Sandwith, goes into this game at 89%.

We do control possession quite a bit in this game (56/44) but just can't buy a goal to get the win. Final Score: 0-0.

Form ratings are much, much better and Alan Marriott gets an 8 and the MoM. We drop to 5th place.

Some Luton news, they have appointed Martin Ling, the current manager at Cambridge Unite, another Blue Square Premier side, as their new manager.

FM

[FrogMan]

December 22, 2010
Wow, what a sucky schedule that is. Three away games in a week, stuck with a bunch of out of form guys. Today, we play 3rd place Darlington on their pitch. When the referee blows for full time, another 0-0 draw, I'm kinda okay with it. We held our own against a legitimate contender to the league title, keeping the ball 52% of the time. It's only when I look at the match overview page and see that I had apparently missed that they had a player redcarded in the 48th minute that I'm not as happy. Still, it's a step in the right direction and that 4-1-3-2 formation is doing what I wanted which is keep the opposition from scoring. Now we need to shoot a bit more and convert these shots a bit more. We drop to 6th place with the draw but are still only 5 points for the top spot.

FM

[FrogMan]

December 26, 2010
Finally a match on our home pitch. We play 20th place Eastbourne Boro. We do dominate the game as well in possession (56/44) as in shots (8 to 3, 7 to 2 on target) and the guys finally score a goal, our first since my taking over of the management of the club, we can't secure a win. Final score: 1-1.

We move back up one spot, to 5th place but we have a game on hand over every team ahead of us.

FM

[FrogMan]

December 28, 2010
Oh come one! Another game?!? And away again?!? And crap, against Luton. Sigh, that's just harsh. All these Hatters are in pretty good condition while we're our condition as a whole is in the crapper. See the halftime ratings to compare conditions between the two sides. Keigan Parker was already at 68% by then and six others are in the 70's while the lowest on the Luton side is 80%. Still, we had the game tied at 0-0 at that point.

It broke down in the second half and they beat us 0-2. We lost possession badly (42/58) and they outshot us 8 to 1 (3 to nil on target). They have apparently brought in a new striker and he got the MoM against us. Blech...

FM

[FrogMan]

January 1, 2011
The transfer window reopens today and as I hope to be able to bring in some players, I look at the leeway the team board is allowing me in budgets. Right now, they have allowed me 10k in transfer and $25,459 a week in wages. Way it works in FMHi is you can pick levels to switch to. Here are the possible levels, including where we're at now:

transfer / wage
10k / 25.5k
77k / 24.2k
150k / 22.9k
220k / 21.6k
280k / 20.3k

Our current wage total is at $18,430 a week. I decide to go with the 150k/22.9k option. It will still give me some room to negotiate wages.

We played 17th place Newport Co. to yet another scoreless draw today. Sigh, getting tired of these. We dropped to 8th place

One thing hits me. Of all our current players, almost all of them have contracts expiring this coming June and they all want some huge wage raise. I mean, stuff like going from $400 a week to $1,800 a week and on and on. Not gonna be easy...

FM

[FrogMan]

January 4, 2011
We play last place Bath at home today and finally record a win. The final score of 1-0 doesn't represent how badly we dominated them, winning possession with 57% and outshoting them 16 to 2 (10 to nothing on target). Their keeper gets the MoM, deservedly so.

I'm seeing some very greedy teams in this transfer window. Teams want sometimes way more than a player is valued at. I have my eyes on a few players, one valued at 24k, transfer listed by request, I bid 16k with my assistant saying the other team sees him has surplus to requirements. Bang, the response comes back, offer rejected and they are saying they would accept an offer in the region of $400,000. Say what???

FM

[FrogMan]

January 8, 2011
We play 10th place Gateshead on their pitch and drop it 0-1 on an 81st minute goal. Getting a bit frustrated as we keep possession close but just never challenge the opposing keeper. We played an attackling 442 formation for this match, that is 4 defenders, 2 MC, AMR/AML and 2 SC.

January 9, 2011
In the hope of generating some offense, I secure the the presence of 19yo Anthony Malbon on loan until the end of the season. Malbon is a clinical striker with a great shooting skill. His player card is attached below.

FM

[FrogMan]

January 10, 2011
Another example of teams wanting more than a player's value is 33yo striker Chris Greenacre. Valued at 48k at lowly Wellington Pheonix, the club is asking for $100k for him. I offer them $100k and 30% sell on percentage which they accept. Negotiating a contract is not too bad although he's looking only for a one contract but I'd like bit longer. His demands for wages are reasonable and we end up agreeing on a 2 year deal. Here's your new Stag (Mansfield Town's nickname is The Stags, learn something new every day :) ), Chris Greenacre!

Hopefully, he can combine with Malbon to give us some punch up front.

January 12, 2011
We play 3rd place AFC Wimbledon on their pitch. This match marks the debut for both Malbon and Greenacre as I move Keigan Parker to the right wing spot. First half goes well and we're tied 1-1 at the break but we crumble in the second half and drop the game 1-3. All three aforementioned players struggled, all three of them getting 5 in ratings.

FM

[FrogMan]

January 13, 2011
Grrr, there's one thing about being greedy but this one pissed me off as all hell. There was this defender, Lee Beevers, currently playing at Colchester. After seeing that Plymouth had made an offer of $16k for him, and remembering that they wanted upwards of $100k when I enquired about him, I enquired again. Yup, they say they would definitely consider an offer in the region of $140k. Err, of course, they would consider it. Go to the player page and try to make an offer to Colchester. Player is valued at $10k so I offer them $28k, in my eyes outbidding Plymouth by quite a bit. On top of that, I offer them 25% sell on percentage. My assistant believes they see him as a first team player which could explains the high value they put in the player. Day passes and they get back to me. Offer rejected, they now say they would accept an offer in the region of $180k now. WTF?!? At that point, still no news of what they did with Plymouth's offer, but I didn't have to wait long. The News drops the very next day: "Plymouth have signed Lee Beevers from Colchester for $16,000" Well Eff you!

This is utterly frustrating. First, all the inflated prices, which you can think of teams not wanting to depart with some players, but then to get f*cked like that. Getting a player of Beevers's caliber for $16k makes me think if I couldn't have had Greenacre for $50k instead of the th $100k we had to shell out for him. Hopefully it's only a one time thing...

On a more positive note, we have secured another player on loan until the end of the season. Say welcome to 20yo AM/F RLC Kireon Cardogan. He comes from Crystal Palace and his versatility and ability to play almost all positions from MC to SC will really help us.

FM

[FrogMan]

January 21, 2011
Our January revamping is still underway and we sign a new keeper to replace incumbent Alan Marriott. Richard Lee comes from Brentford and we had to pay $18k to get him.

We're now over the wage budget, at a total weekly wage of $24,469 off a budget of only $22,885. I still have a transfer budget of $25.5k but I adjust the budgets to give me more room in wages. Transfer budget dropped to zero, new wage budget is $23,380, still not high enough. I'll see if I cannot move a couple players. We have some really bad players that should be allowed to go.

As I add players all around the pitch, I'm hit with one monstrously bad news. Mark Preece, one of our starting centrebacks suffered a calf strain and will miss two months. These defenders didn't look like much on paper, but they have never really let us down. It's our scoring, or lack thereof, that has hurt us. This injury might give us a hard time. We are really thin on the back line and there really is not much available on the market. No loanees to speak of, and no transfer money left...

Looking at my assistant's team report, he agrees that we are weakest in defense but he can't come up with even one name for replacement back there. Ugh. Elsewhere, Kieron Cadogan is listed as our strongest midfielder while Chris Greenacre is listed as our strongest forward. I at least did well to improve our squad there.

FM

[FrogMan]

January 22, 2011
We play 6th place Grimsby at home. We play a very strong first before we fall a bit in the second. We still manage to win it, 2-1 on goals from Greenacre and Malbon. Nice to see these guys contribute. Kyle Nix gets the MoM, completing 42 of 57 passes in the process with an assist to boot.

January 25, 2011
We play 20th place Histon on their pitch. This game is another tale of two halves. Struggle mightily in the first, got back in the game in the second. Final Score: 2-2. Ryan Williams is our saviour, coming in at the 59 minute mark to score a brace in the last 40 minutes of the match to give us the draw from being down 0-2.

January 29, 2011
We play 14th place Kidderminster at home. It ends in another draw, 1-1 this time. Were unlucky in the first half but got back in the game later on. For once, I'd like us to play a solid 90 minutes of football... Anthony Malbon scored our lone goal and Richard Lee got the MoM.

February 1st, 2011
Team board still feel it would be unfair to comment on my overall performance as a manager.

FM

[FrogMan]

February 9, 2011
We play 22nd place Forest Green on their pitch. They do have the best on us on most statstical categories and are up 2-1 at the half but we claw back and pull even in the 72nd minute on a Kieron Cadogan goal. Chris Greenacre is our other scorer. Final Score: 2-2.

We're now able to score a bit more and are in 8th place, 7 points from a playoff spot with 13 games to play.

FM

[FrogMan]

February 12, 2011
We play 19th place Hayes & Yeading at home. This one shows the kind of domnation I had been waiting for. Not only did we win possession with 59% but we kept them shotless while putting 3 of our 5 shots on target. Greenacre scored on a penalty and Tyrone Thompson, one of the original Stag, scored the other. Keigan Parker hurt his foot and will miss about 3 weeks.

We remain in 8th place but are now 5 points away from a playoff spot.

FM

[FrogMan]

February 19, 2011
We play 3rd place Wrexham on their pitch. We finished our last game playing my beloved 442 diamond setup and that's how we'll start this game. You can see our selection below. They score first, in the 32nd minute but one of their player is sent off in the 39th minute. We do attack and have many chances at coming back but they shut us down the rest of the way. Final Score: 0-1.

Grr, that one sucks. Even possession, playing an opponent one man down for 60 minutes, outshooting them 8 to 6 (3 to 1 on target) yet not being able to at least bring back one point is frustrating.

FM

[FrogMan]

February 26, 2011
We play 19th place Tamworth at home. It's clear right from the start that we have really started playing as a team. We jump to a 2-0 start after only 8 minutes and will add 3 more in the second half on our way to a splendid 5-1 win. We put 10 of our 13 shots on target, completed 78% of our passes (to them completing 68%) and won 90% of our tackles. Well done guys!

We finished the match one man down when Kieron Cadogan was sent off for a second yellow card in the game in the 85th minute.

We remain in 8th place after this win but are only 5 points away from a playoffs spot currently held by Luton Town. Luton do have a match on hand over us.

FM

[FrogMan]

March 2, 2011
Hrm, the team board still feel it would be unfair to comment on my overall performance as a manager of the club. At least they are patient...

March 5, 2011
We play last place Southport on their pitch. DC Mark Preece has resumed training following his injury. This is odd but I'm kind of nervous to put him back him. We've been playing real well lately and I don't want to break our stride...

This is an odd game. With only 37% possession in the first half, we pull away with a 2-1 lead. We start controlling the ball more in the second half and pull away some more. Final Score: 4-2.

Anthony Malbon scores two in the win but it's Kyle Nix who gets the MoM.

FM

[FrogMan]

March 8, 2011
While the transfer window closed on January 31, the free/loan window is still open and I keep monitoring if players show of up out of contract or are put up for loan. Not much was available until this young DC caught my eye. Name is Tom Parkes and he currently plays at Leicester. He's 19yo and he joins us on loan until the end of the season with Leicester still paying 100% of his wages. Skill wise, he's much more well rounded than any of our other starting defenders.

FM

[FrogMan]

March 10, 2011
Here's another player we get to come to Mansfield on loan until the end of the season. Not too sure we really need another striker, but my assistant seems to think that Robert Hall has the potential to be one of the best players at the club. As we get to have him without paying one cent of wage, I'd say getting the 17yo to play for us is nice.

FM

[FrogMan]

March 16, 2011
Note to self: 8th place is not considered a respectable position by your team board. I learn this after seeing my team board confidence report (see attachment). They expect the club to attain a "respectable" league position, we're currently sitting in 8th place and they add that they are NOT happy with the current position of the team ergo 8th <> respectable position. Good thing is they do acknowledge that they are aware that this position is my predecessor's fault.

We play 14th place York at home. It's a pretty tight games with both teams scoring within 3 minutes of one another. Them first in the 55th minute, then us in the 58th. Final Score: 1-1.

Tom Parkes struggled in his debut, recording a form rating of 5. Robert Hall did much better, scoring in his debut. Tyrone Thompson Pulled a hamstring and will miss 3 weeks. He was our current AMC started but we have plenty of replacement, especially with the arrival of all the new strikers. They free up Keigan Parker to play in the AMC spot instead of up front.

We were only 4 points from 5th place Luton prior to the match but they gained two on us today.

FM

[FrogMan]

March 19, 2011
We play 9th place Kettering on their pitch. I decide to rest Chris Greenacre for the start of the game, giving the start to Robert Hall. Holy crap is this a bad one. We are down 0-3 after only 25 minutes and never recover after that. We didn't really get outclassed after that but they were very opportunistic in those 25 minutes. Three shots on target, three goals. Final Score: 0-3.

The good thing is we had 6 points on Kettering so we retain our 8th place but are now only 3 points away from them.

FM

[FrogMan]

March 26, 2011
We play 22nd place Altrincham at home after a good week of rest. Overall, the team is in much better shape, condition wise, than when I took over but getting a full week of rest is always good.

Ugh, Keigan Parker goes down and has to leave the field in the 17th minute. So much for that plan of him playing the AMC spot. Cadogan finished the game in his spot. It's a comfortable 2-0 win for us. We controlled the ball 60% of the time, puttin 5 of our 7 shots on target, compared to 1 out of 4 for them. Interesting stat too, we were awarded 7 corners and they got none. I guess we did put some pressure on their back line. Their keeper saved them from some embarassment with a Man of the Match performance.

Following the game, I learn that Parker will miss about 3 weeks with a broken toe.

FM

[FrogMan]

March 31, 2011
Three months from now, if things stand as they are now, I'll be left with only a couple starters as all my others will be out the door. Seriously, most of them want to see their wage doubled, or more. Here's a sample of wage increases that some players currently seen as starters are looking for:
DL Sandwith, from $700 to $1500
DR Silk, from $850 to $1800
DC Smith, from $600 to $1450
DMC Somner, from $850 to $1950
ML Nix, from $700 to $2200
AMC/SC Parker, from $1000 to $2200
MR Williams, from $750 to $2200

These 7 players currently cost us $5450 in weekly wage but would cost us $13300 if I were to give them everything they want. Yeah, as if this will happen...

It's not as if these guys are all irreplaceable, but I'd like to keep some sort of continuity, you know, keep things cohesive a bit. We'll see how it'll shake out.

Mark Preece a 23yo DC that sort of lost his starting spot when he got injured was only looking for an increase from $850 to $1050 so I take a shot and offer him $850. He accepts so that's at least one that'll be there comes the start of next season.

FM

[FrogMan]

April 2, 2011
Oh nice! I have won the Blue Square Bet Premier Manager of the Month Award for March! Go me!!! :)

We're piling on the awards too. Matt Somner has won the Blue Square Bet Premier Player of the Month Award for March. Even better, the runner-up was Mansfield's own Kyle Nix. Well done guys! Somner has had the following form ratings in his last five matches: 9-8-8-8-9. Well deserved award. Following this, I revisit their wage requirements and try something. Somner is looking for a wage increase from $850 to $2200, I offer him $1250 with a $28k signing on fee. Same thing for Nix who's looking for an increase in wage from $700 to $2200. I offer him $1250 with a $36k signing on fee. I gave them both a big club release clause. Somner is 28 and his deal would be for two years while Nix is 25 and his deal would be for three seasons.

The Board's still not happy with the current position of the team but they are aware that it is my predecessor's fault.

We play 4th place Rushden on their pitch. We take a 1-0 lead on a goal from Chris Greenacre in the 29th minute as we play good football. We definitely belong with them in terms of level of play. They do tie the game in the 76th minute for a final score score of 1-1 but I'm really quite okay with it. A draw against one of the top teams in our division, on the road no less, that's good, very good.

We remain in 8th place after the draw, now 7 points away from a playoff spot with only 5 games to play. Rushden dropped from 4th to 5th.

Southport is the first team to be officially relegated from the Blue Square Premier.

Following the game, I learn that both Somner and Nix have agreed to the offered wage. This tells me one thing, that players are greedy but can be negotiated with. Hopefully it'll hold true with the others. We'll see...

For now, these two resignings have put us above the wage budget of $23,380. Our current wage total is at $24,321, so about 1K too much. With the season winding down, I might cut ties with some players who simply have no hope of seeing the field anymore. Candidates in that respect include AMR Adam Smith and Steve Istead, with respective weekly wages of $850 and $700, or DC Steve Foster who's currently earning $850. He's 36 and he's said to retire at the end of the season. Looking at his player file, it says he's got 22 appearances for the team this season but I don't remember playing him once. An average form rating of 6.36 will do that to the impression a manager has of you, especially at the centreback spot.

FM

[FrogMan]

March 7, 2011
I've finally decided to clean up our wage bills. Out are reserves keeper Neil Collett, backup oldie centreback Steve Foster and backup striker Paul Connor, all names you've not seen often on our match reports. Foster and Connor cost us 10k and 12k respectively to buy out the three months left on their contracts but we're now under the wage budget of $23,380 with a weekly wage total of $23,298.

March 9, 2011
We play 17th place Fleetwood at home. Game starts okay but we're not really dominating. It's 1-1 at the half and we even go down 1-2 in the 66th minute on a fluke goal. That second half was ours all the way and I was afraid we'd drop the game on that one goal but that was without counting on Robert Hall's contribution. Hall was brought into the game in the 59th minute to replace Anthony Malbon. Good thing I brought him in as he scored two goals in the last 14th minute, right after Tom Parkes had brought the score level on a header. Hall gets the Man of the Match and we escape with a 4-2 win. Honorable mention to Paul Stonehouse who rarely sees the field as a backup left winger. He came into the game in the 75th minute when I moved Kyle Nix over to the AMC spot and he got himself a nice form rating of 9 in only 15 minutes of play.

We put 7 of 10 shots on target in the second half after going 3 out of 5 in the first half. Once again, corners told the story of the game. We were awarded 10 corners to them only getting 2. At one point, we had like 4 corners in a row, going from side to side, keeping the pressure on their keeper.

We remain in 8th place following the win, four points away from 7th place AFC Wimbledon and 5 points away from a playoffs spot and 5th place Grimsby. It's pretty tight up there. Luton in 3rd place is only 6 points away from us with 4 games to play.

FM

[FrogMan]

April 16, 2011
Rough game today as we play 2nd place Crawley on their pitch. We take an early lead on a Tyron Thompson goal in the 18th minute and we're holding on for most of the game after that. They do pull back even in the 71st minute and the game ends with both teams locked in a 1-1 draw. Richard Lee made a few great saves to keep us in this one but as a whole, we were competitive.

We remain in 8th place following the draw, 7 points away from a playoffs spot with only three matches to play. Magic number is now 2.

Bath City are the second team to be relegated from the Blues Square Premier.

FM

[FrogMan]

April 23, 2011
We play 1st place Darlington at home. Tough game for us and it starts badly. Not that we're really being outclassed but we go down 0-1 in the 18th minute and then 0-2 in the 40th minute. Halftime stats are pretty even though, they were just more opportunistic than us. The second half is even more to our advantage but doesn't translate to the scoreboard. Final Score: 0-2.

Ugh, kinda frustrating result as from the looks of it, we should have at least come out of this game with a draw yet we come out with what looks like an ugly loss. :(

We remain in 8th place but are now sealed off from any playoff spot, 9 points away from Luton and the 5th place with 2 games to play.

Altrincham have been relegated from the Blue Square Premier.

FM

[FrogMan]

April 26, 2011
We play 13th place Cambridge on their pitch. I'm pulling my hair out in the 4th minute when I see them take an apparent lead but the goal doesn't stand, there was offside. Phew. We take that scare and turn it around, taking a 1-0 lead in the 35th minute off a Chris Greenacre goal. We double our lead in the 87th minute on a fluke goal by Kieron Cadogan on a 40 yard long centered ball that was mishandled by their keeper. Final Score: 2-0.

Stats are very even but I could get the feeling that we took control of play during the second half. Matt Somner got the MoM.

With one match to be played, we cannot go any higher than our current 8th place but we need to win to secure it and not drop to 9th...

Darlington have won the Blue Square Premier title.

FM

[FrogMan]

May 1st, 2011
We've played out the end of our season with a 2-2 draw against AFC Wimbledon. We close the season in 8th place. Given that the team was in 4th place when I took over, I can't really be happy with that end result, but I did do quite a bit of change and felt we were doing much more to my liking towards the end.

GK Richard Lee ends the season 4th in forms rating average in the Blue Square Premier with 7.52.Kyle Nix is 13th with 7.34.

Fearing not having any player to start the new season, I offer some new contracts to our current players. MR Ryan Williams, DL Kevin Sandwith & Paul Stonehouse, DR Gary Silk, DC Chris Smith, AMC/FC Louis Briscoes all agree to new deals, pushing us just a bit over our wage budget.

May 15, 2011
I add a new DC/MC in 24 yo Byron Webster. My scout says there's not much difference between him and our current best central defender Tom Parkes, who will leave us when his loan is over. Webster had been playing with Doncaster in the Championship. I like is heading skills and his strength. I'm hoping he'll be fighting for high balls in the middle of our defence.

FM

[FrogMan]

May 20, 2011
Teams are cutting ties with players to free up some wages and I go bargain hunting. 28yo left fullback Peter Gilbert was looking for a weekly wage of $2,200 but he agrees to my offer of $1,650 a week. I know I just resigned our two left backs but I think he'll bring some interesting skills to our backline as we just didn't have a defend as well rounded as he is.

Well, crap. Luton not only made the playoff but won them. They are promoting to League 2.

In an odd bit of news, I learn that current starting right winger Ryan Williams just announced he will retire at the end of the season. The announce comes less than two weeks after him signing a new contract. He's 32.

In a rough bit of negotiation, I get forward Keigan Parker to agree to a new contract. He was looking for $2,000 a week but I only offered him $1,250 a week with $32k in sign on bonus. I'm glad we got him back.

FM

[FrogMan]

stay tuned as I plan to report through a very active offseason and bring you to 2011-12 and a whole new look Mansfield side. :)

FM

[thehitcat]

Will do Froggy! A very enjoyable dynasty as always!

[FrogMan]

Will do Froggy! A very enjoyable dynasty as always!

thanks, appreciate the support. :)

FM

[FrogMan]

June 1, 2011
The board feels I should perform slightly better in my role. Yeah, I knew that. I too would like our club to be doing better. :)

You can see the 2010-11 season review in the attachments.

Martin Ling is the guy who took over for me at Luton. And yeah, he won Manager of the Year in the Blue Square Premier. Bite me...

FM

[FrogMan]

June 10, 2011
The board inform me of their expectations for the upcoming season. They again expect the club to achieve a respectable league position this season. To achieve that expectation, they are giving me a weekly wage budget of $25,426 and a whopping transfer budget of $1,650. Woohoo, let's go spending on the transfer market!!!! Oh, you mean, there are no zeros after that 1650? ooookay. I feel bold and I tell them I think we can achieve a playoff spot. They give me $1,850 in transfer budget (woohoo again!!!) but more importantly, they raise the wage budget to $27,967. This will come in handy, especially if I want to secure some better loanees and I need to pay some of their wages.

The board would have given me $1,900/$29,238 if I'd been shooting for promotion and $2,000/$30,508 but I'm not comfortable gunning for higehr than a simple playoff appearance.


June 17, 2011
Well, it was no joke. Ryan Williams has retired and we've got nobody to man the right wing. Current wage total is at $22,951.


June 22, 2011
We don't remain wingerless on our right side for long. Newcomer is 26yo Ashley Vincent. He only had 5 appearances with League 1 Colchester but averaged 7.2 in form. Felt kinda lucky to get him as he was looking for $4.2k in weekly wages while my board only allowed me to offer him up to $2.4k. I did put in a nice $43k signing on fee to sweeten the deal. I feel he's got a great mix of skills for a winger. Good pace, good dribbling, decent stamina.


FM

[FrogMan]

June 23, 2011
Oh, some players are graduating from our youth setup. David Middleton is the first one, an 18yo striker who already looks much better than some players that were starters when I took over.


FM

[FrogMan]

July 4, 2011
Sam Graham is a second striker to come up from our youth squad. He's 17yo though and I guess his upside is the reason my assistant rate him as our best young striker, ahead of Middleton.


FM

[FrogMan]

July 7, 2011
Took a bit of jimmying back and forth but I finally secure a nice loanee in 23yo D RC Dominic Shimmin. He'll be with us until the end of the season. I like that he's a bit older than most typical loanees, especially for a centreback. My assistant described him as twice the player of our current best central defender Byron Webster. I love how well rounded he is, skill wise.


FM

[FrogMan]

July 7, 2011
Wow, that youth squad was quite good this year. Byron Hart, a 17yo M LC is the third notable player to promote from our youth setup. He's got diddly poo for stamina but otherwise has a lot of skills for being only 17. My assistant rtaes him a four star for potential ability...

We're now getting close to our wage budget at $26,185 out of $27,967.

FM

[FrogMan]

July 13, 2011
Graeme Owens, currently at Kilmarnock, is another 23yo possible loanee I'd been goign after. I finally secure him, and he agrees to come on a season long loan, after I offered Kilmarnock to pay his whole weekly wage of $1,950. This puts us over the wage budget but I think he will be very much worth it. The kid's got all the skills I want in a winger, plus he can play both sides.


FM

[FrogMan]

July 23, 2011
We play our first of three friendly, against League 1 Gillingham, at home. We record a nice 2-0 win on goals from Chris Greenacre and Ashley Vincent with Vincent getting the MoM. I liked what I saw in that match. Sure it's only a friendly but They are a couple levels above us...


July 30, 2011
We play League 2 Yeovil on their pitch and this one's a bit of a setback. We lose it 0-1 but win possession and are even in stats.

August 1, 2011
With a clean slate and without the league position hanging over my head, the board is now satisfied with my management of the club. They say the positive atmosphere in the changing room has been encouraging and I must agree. Morale is way up and it will be nice to go into the season with a positive outlook on things.

August 6, 2011
We close our schedule of friendlies with a match against Blue Square South side Forest Green on their pitch. It's a satisfying 3-1 win for us on two goals from Greenacre and another from Vincent. Vincent got another MoM.

August 7, 2011
Keigan Parker is again injured and will miss a couple weeks. Attached is what our current selection looks like. Youngster Sam Graham is set to be our second starting striker, but nothing's set in stone there.


FM

[FrogMan]

August 8, 2011
I go against my head scout's assessment and sign 18yo gk Peter Donnelly away from Havant & W's. My scout believes he's not good enough to succeed at the club but at only $260 a week, on a free transfer, he's worth a shot in my book. I sign him to a three year deal.

The 2011-12 season starts on August 13!

[FrogMan]

Attached is our squad selection as it stands when we enter the 2011-12 season. The grey rating is their average form rating

To me, it's a much better squad than what I had when I took over. Now, I only hope the new guys will mesh well with the few that remain from last season.

FM

[FrogMan]

August 13, 2011
The 2011-12 season is finally here!!! We start if off on the road, against Gainsborough. We seem to go through some growing pains early on and it's 2-2 at the half. Peter Gilbert scored in the 11th minute but they replied with two quick goals before Chris Greenacre put us back on even terms.

The second half was all ours though. Graeme Owens, just Like Gilbert, scored on his debut and Kyle Nix added to our lead late in the game. Final Score: 4-2.

Stats were pretty even but going by the highlights, we seemed to be getting the better chances. Kyle Nix gets the MoM.


August 16, 2011
Hrm, Graeme Owens sprained a wrist in training and will miss about a week.

We play Fleetwood at home. We take a very early lead with a Matt Somner goal in the 5th minute, then add to that lead on a Greenacre goal in the 42nd but they take one back with a goal in injury time of the first half.

One of their player gets a second yellow in the 54th minute and it's all downhill for them from there. We turn it on and never look back, controlling the ball at will. Dominic Shimmin heads one in in the 65th minute and David Middleton even scores in the waning moments. Final Score: 4-1.

Another high scoring affair. Even better is our 58% possession ratio and our 16 shots on target out of 20. Impressive stuff. Kyle Nix gets his second MoM in a row with a rating of 10.

We're sitting atop the league table, one of four teams with two wins in two games.

FM

[FrogMan]

August 17, 2011
Newport County have offered to loan David Middleton until the end of the season with a clause to recall him if I'd want to. They will pay 100% of his $260 weekly wages. I accept the offer and he, in turn, acccepts to go on loan with them.

August 20, 2011
We play Rushden on their pitch. They are a legitimate contender and it's unfortunate that our second half of the game broke down so hard. It was 1-1 at the halftime break and we had good stats, comparable to them. They score as the second half started and then Louis Briscoe got sent off for a professional foul inside our penalty area. Not only did we have to finish the game a man down but they added to their lead with the ensuing penalty. To add to our rough time, Dominic Shimmin had to leave the game in the 78th minute, just moments after I'd used my last substitution so we finished the match with 9 men on the pitch. That was a pitiful second half. Final Score: 1-3.

I'm kind of encouraged that we held our own, on their pitch no less.

Shimmin will be out of action for about 3 weeks after twisting his knee in the game. My head physio is making me nervous here though. He says he has long term concerns over Shimmin's fitness. Hrm, injury prone maybe?

Good news is that Keigan Parker resumed full training following his shin injury.

FM

[FrogMan]

August 23, 2011
We play Barrow at home. Chris Smith takes Shimmin's place at centreback. What a crazy first half. Shot are 10(6) for us, 7(3) for them and we're ahead 2-0 at the break on two Keigan Parker goals. Sure glad to have him back.

We collapse at the start of the second half and within 20 minutes we're all even, 2-2. Graeme Owens saves us with a nice goal in the 72nd minute. Final Score: 3-2.

We win possession with 56% and shots are quite even, 15(9) for us, 15(8) for them. Very offensive. You don't often see this many shot in a game.

August 25, 2011
An interesting rumour has linked us to Barnet's Anwar Uddin. Uddin is a 29yo centreback with great leadership. I don't have a full scouting report on him but what I see decent enough heading and tackling that I think he could work out for us. He's valued at $2k but I offer them to pick him up on a free transfer with a 50% sell on percentage. I will probably never sell him anyway, just let him go when his contract's over. They accept the offer and I negotiate with Uddin over a contract. He wants $2k a week but there's no way I want to pay him that. I offer him $1.4k for two years with some money up front and he accepts! Say welcome to the newest Stag! As I said, decent enough heading and tackling, with bonus aggression, decision and positioning. He should be fine with us. Also, if Shimmin stays healthy, I could keep Uddin at DC and move Shimmin to the right where Gary Silk has struggled in the first few games.

FM

[FrogMan]

August 27, 2011
We play 17th place Lincoln. They're struggling early on this season, with 1 win, 1 draw and 2 losses to show for it. Sam Graham is on fire to start this one and scores two within a couple minutes of one another and after 12 minutes, we're ahead 2-0. They claw their way back in and by the 61st minute, we're again all tied, at 2-2. Chris Smith makes his presence known by heading in a corner and we go away with the three points. Final Score: 3-2.

Sam Graham picked up the MoM with his couple goals and we're gonna need him to do more of this as Chris Greenacre had to leave the game in the 49th minute after twisting his ankle. He will miss about 2 months. Now is not the time for Keigan Parker to pick up one of his crappy injury.

August 29, 2011
It's a pretty congested schedule to start this season as we play again, only two days removed from our last match. This time it's at home against 17th place Kidderminster.

We're very opportunistic to start the game as we jump to a 2-0 lead on only 3 shots, although all 3 are on target. Tyrone Thompson and Keigan Parker are our scorers. Thompson is our latest casualty when he leaves the match in the 50th minute atfer suffering a calf strain. We keep the pressure in the second half, adding to our lead early on in the half on a Matt Somner goal while completely shutting them down the rest of the way. Final Score: 3-0

Tyrone Thompson had a great 50 minutes of play and gets the MoM. The bad news is that he will miss about 2 months with his injured calf. Ugh...

We move up to first place in the Blue Square Premier, ahead of Rushden! Outstanding start to the season!

FM

[Marc Vaughan]

Out of interest - what team instructions do you have set and have you tinkered with the player roles at all? (I'm guessing hard tackling and pressing?)

Nice report - I'm enjoying reading it :D

[FrogMan]

Out of interest - what team instructions do you have set and have you tinkered with the player roles at all? (I'm guessing hard tackling and pressing?)

Nice report - I'm enjoying reading it :D

We're still playing the diamond 442 (4 D, DMC, MR/ML, AMC, SC), switching from defensive to attacking depending if we're away (mostly defensive) or home although I've stayed at attacking very often lately, only to pull back to balanced. Short passing is the predominant pick. We do use pressing but have been for most of last season, without much if any effect on the number of injuries. I sometimes turn it off, especially when we play many games in a short period of time and I want to rest the guys a bit.

Tackling is always set to normal. I think I used hard tackling once last season and went back to normal the very next game.

Player roles are fairly conventional. I sometimes fool around with them a bit but not much. Defenders are set to default. DMC is set to "ball winning midfielder", both wingers to winger, AMC to advanced playmaker. One striker is a "deep lying forward" while the other has been going between "target man", "poacher" or "advanced forward".

I'm thinking it's simply a string of bad luck as they often happen in the game (handheld or desktop version).

FM

[FrogMan]

August 31, 2011
With the injuries we've suffered, I set myself to find some loanees that could come and bolster our squad for free. I offer Chesterfield to take on their 19yo AM/F RC Tendaya Darwika until the end of the season, without paying a dime of his wage of course. They agree and he in turn agrees to come play for us on loan. Might look like all my loan request work but Darwika is maybe the fourth player I've tried to bring in in the last few days. Probably not the highest on my list but my assistant says he is twice the player of our best young forward Sam Graham. Seeing how nicely Graham has filled in for us, I'm sure Darwika could be useful when caught in a pinch.

FM

[FrogMan]

September 2nd, 2011
Woah, I have won the Blue Square Premier Manager of the Month award for August. Go me! :)

The board are now satisfied by my management of the team and add that this has been underlined by the joy of the fans at the current form of the team. Life is good right now.


September 4, 2011
We play 22nd place AFC Telford on their pitch. They are still winless after 6 matches. Even though we start strong, they get first crack at goal and even put one past Richard Lee but it's disallowed because of a offside. We unleash the fury on them after that. It's 2-0 at the half, both goals coming from Keigan Parker, and 3-1 at full time. Our last goal was scored by Sam Graham. we put 10 of 13 shots on target. Graeme Owens got the MoM.

Reinforcing my opinion that he's been on fire lately, Keigan Parker is given the Blue Square Premier Player of the Month award for August. It's Mansfield everywhere!

Following that award, there are rumours that Parker could be linked with a $52k move to a club called The New Saints. Never ever heard of them before. They seem to be a professional club in Wales with a stadium capacity of 3000. WTF? I deny that Parker is available for transfer.

I spot another youngster to bring in on a loan. Name's Reuben Noble-Lazarus and he's an 18 yo AM/F RLC currently playing at Barnsley. My assistant says he is twice the player of our best right winger Tendaya Darwika. Well, that'd be an upgrade, no? I try to get them to let him go to us for free, but they keep refusing. His weekly wage is only $180 so I bite the bullet and offer to pay his whole wage and they agree. He joins us on loan until the end of the season. He's got great dribbling and passing and can play about anywhere starting at the centerline.


September 8, 2011
Dang! Tendaya Darwika will be out of action for about 3 weeks after suffering a thigh strain in training. Guess the signing of Noble-Lazarus will be very useful...

FM

[FrogMan]

September 10, 2011
We play 9th place Crawley at home. Out for this game are Thompson, Darwika, Greenacre and Shimmin although Shimmin is getting very close, only a few days away. Graeme Owens scores what ends up being the only goal of the game in the 15th minute. Final Score: 1-0.

It was a hard fought battle and we lose another warrior when Sam Graham leaves the game in the 44th minute after straining a thigh. Sigh, he will miss about 3 weeks.


September 13, 2011
Newport County are really scouting our kids listed for loan. They offer to take on young keeper Peter Donnelly for a season long loan. They won't pay his wage but that's okay. I only want him to have a shot at playing, something which I'd really have a hard time giving to him, given the position he plays. I accept and off he goes.

FM

[FrogMan]

September 17, 2011
We play 3rd place Kettering on their pitch. It's getting hard to field a decent starting eleven now with all these injured players. Shimmin's back in the lineup and given how well Chris Smith has done at DC while he was out of the lineup, averaging 7 in form rating, I decide to start Shimmin at DR instead of Garry Silk. We keep the game close for most of the match, playing a very conservative and defensive game. It's 1-1 at the half and I'm thinking we can get away from there with a draw until they sink us with a last minute score in the 90th minute. Final Score: 1-2.

What else is new, another striker goes down in this game. Reuben Noble-Lazarus is the latest casualty. He twisted his knee and will miss about 3 weeks. I'm just about to go buy a pair of cleats and suit up to take a spot on the dang field...

The loss drops us to 2nd part, in a threeway tie with Rushden and Kettering with Grimsby right behind us with a game on hand.

FM

[FrogMan]

September 19, 2011
Trying to shore up our attacking front, I scour the list of players available for free. Many are interesting but few want to come play for us, choosing to stay home instead of fighting it out with a team trying to win promotion. I fin a 24yo AM/S C whom my scout describes as being "decent" which means that there's not much difference, in my scout's eyes at least, between him and our strong forward Chris Greenacre. He's looking for a 3 year contract worth $2.6k a week. Since we'Re running a bit over our wage budget, our board will allow me wages up to $1.75k for him. I offer him $1.5k for 3 years with a signing on fee of $26.5k and to my surprise, he agrees.

The odd thing is that my assistant seems to disagree with my scout. He says Grimes is some way off the standard of Greenacre and that he isn't considered one of the best forwards at the club. (not to Marc, the exact sentence was "Grimes isn't considered one of the better forward's at the club". Might want to correct that straying 's there ;))

Anyway, he's a natural center forward and is accomplished at AMC and competent on the whole right side.

And ayup, another day, another injury. My physio was probably right in saying he had some long term concerns over Shimmin's fitness. He will miss a month after straining a calf in training... Gary Silk goes back into the starting lineup.

September 20, 2011
We play 6th place Tamworth at home and despite what looks like a makeshift starting eleven, we come out clawing out and we're ahead 2-0 at the half. At that point, we had put 5 of 9 shots on target, had completely denied them of any shots, on target or not, and had held the ball for an impressive 63% of the time.

We cool off just a tad in the second half but still add to our lead. Final Score: 3-0.

Kyle Nix, Louis Briscoe and Ashley Vincent all score a goal in the win but it's Graeme Owens who got the MoM.

[FrogMan]

September 24, 2011
These weeks of three games are sometimes tough when you have a full complement of players, let's say they're very tough when you are going through an injury rash like we have.

Oh come on now DAMMIT! :rant: Matt Somner twisted his knee in practice and will miss about 3 weeks. This does it and I finally take some time to tweak our training schedule. I dial down the fitness aspect of the three main schedules from "medium" to "light". You can see the schedule in attachment.

For people used to the PC version of the game, you can't create new training schedules in the FMHi version. There are 6 preset schedules that you can tweak to your liking: Goalkeeper, Defending, Attacking, Fitness, Technical, General. I usually have my keepers on Goalkeepers (duh!), my defenders and DMC on Defending (double duh!), my general midfielders on Technical and my strikers, AMCs and wingers on Attacking. IIRC, the only real tweak I've ever done to those is increased the motivation aspect of every schedule. There's no real way of knowing how harsh a specific schedule is. I'm just hoping the drop down in fitness work will keep players from overexerting themselves...

We play 8th place Histon on their pitch. Looking at the player stats for the league, I'm happy to see that Keigan Parker comes in first for average form rating with an outstanding 8.0 average. Graeme Owens is in 8th place with an average form rating of 7.77 and Kyle Nix is in 10th with an average of 7.7. Parker is also the current top goal scorer with 6 while Nix and Owens are #1 and #2 in assists with 7 and 6 assists respectively.

The game is rough on us. No, no new injuries, just being outplayed. We're down 0-1 at the halfway point but more specifically, we're hardly touching the ball. We're barely surviving but Richard Lee keeps us in the game with a few mazing saves. They put 13 of 14 shots on target but he never lets one more past him. We're putting just enough pressure on their defenders late in the game that they commit a foul in their penalty area, the ref points the spot. PENALTY!!! Keigan Parker puts it past their keeper and we leave the field quickly when the final whistle blows, afraid the cops will come after us as we'd just robbed a kid of his candy. Final Score: 1-1.

Wow, just wow. We dodged a major bullet there...

Add to my joy the fact that both Rushden and Grimsby (who'd been hot on our trail and really on fire lately) stumble. They both lost and we regain sole possession of first place. Rushden got destroyed 4-1 by Lincoln.

FM

[FrogMan]

training schedules coming in a few minutes...

FM

[FrogMan]

There they are. I only included the three main ones.

FM

[terpkristin]

Woohoo!
Following along another Froggie dynasty.

/tk

[FrogMan]

Woohoo!
Following along another Froggie dynasty.

/tk

hehe, didn't know if you were interested or I would have mentioned it to you earlier... :)

FM

[FrogMan]

September 27, 2011
Quick roundup of who's out and when they might be coming back:
Tendaya Darwika, a few days
Chris Greenacre, 10 days
Tyrone Thompson, 10 days
Sam Graham, 1 week
Reuben Noble-Lazarus, 2 weeks
Dominic Shimmin, 3 weeks
Matt Somner, 3 weeks

Soon we'll have an overload of strikers and I'll be able to field a 1-1-8 kind of lineup. :)

We play 22nd place AFC Wimbledon at home. We're go up by 2 before the first half is over on goals form Ashley Vincent and Keigan Parker and I'm feeling good about our play. hat else is new, we lose Anwar Uddin to injury to at the start of the second half but we almost build on it and add two more goals, from Ashley Grimes and Louis Briscoe, before the game is over. Final Score: 4-0.

Impressive showing. 57% possession, 10 shots on target out of 12. Really controlled the field of play. MoM goes to Ashley Grimes who's fitting well in the squad.

Uddin, the current replacement for injured DMC Matt Somner, will miss two weeks with a bruised shin. Dammit guys, get some new shin guards or something!

October 1, 2011
Interesting, Lance Key of Rushden won the Blue Square Premier Manager of the Month award and the Runner-up was Ian Sampson of Grimsby. Looking at how Rushden has played in the last month, I don't see anything better than what we did although I'd have thought that Grimsby had done better than both our clubs.

The board are satisfied with my management of the club. They again point out the happiness of the fans at the current form of the team. You can see the board's confidence ratings attached below.

We play 24th and last place Newport County on their place. This is interesting because they are usually playing to of our players, out there on loans, but they show up as unavailable due to league rules. Guess it's automatic that a loanee cannot play the team he is under contract with. Paul Stonehouse takes over at the DMC spot.

They have a goal disallowed because of an offside in teh 4th minute but we take control of the first half after that. The score is a satisfying 2-0 for us at the half. That's when the fit hits the shan and we forget how to play defensively. They score two in the first 4 minutes of the second half and we're back on level terms. We attack a bit more and take a 3-2 lead on a nice Keigan Parker goal in the 71st minute but the ref awards them a dubious penalty in the 84th minute. They convert it and we're wack to square one. More attack from us results in a goal in the 90th minute. Surely that must be the winning goal but oh no, we let another one in at the 93 minute mark. Gah! Final Score: 4-4.

Keepers of both team each received the same form rating as the number of goals they conceded, i.e. a 4. Blech. Talk about a defensive letdown. So disappointing to drop 2 points on what looked like a sure win.

FM

[terpkristin]

hehe, didn't know if you were interested or I would have mentioned it to you earlier... :)

FM

I admit I rarely read dynasties and when I do, I lurk, but I like reading your FM stuff. It's always entertaining. :)

/tk

[FrogMan]

I admit I rarely read dynasties and when I do, I lurk, but I like reading your FM stuff. It's always entertaining. :)

/tk

Thanks for the kind words. I try to make it as lively as possible and I've found it helps with my English when I write a bit... :)

As a disclaimer, I also rarely read the dynasty forum, until I decide to start a new one, then I see what I've missed and I read a few here and there...

FM

[FrogMan]

October 4, 2011
Oh crap, another game with little rest, and against Grimsby of all teams. They are in 2nd place, only 1 point behind us but they have a game on hand. Even only 13 games into the season, that's as close to a must win as there will ever be one and following the defensive debacle we just went through, let's say I'm not feeling too confident. Even at home, the bookies have us as underdogs...

We do come out strong though and Ashley Grimes gives us a 1-0 lead in the fading moments of the first half. We were losing possession slightly at the point but had been buzzing around their net. They do put a lot more pressure on us in the second half but we hold on to win it 1-0.

Gary Silk came out of nowhere a couple times with great tackles and he gets the MoM.

Rushden drew in their game thus we move a full 3 points away from them. Looking at the board's confidence ratings, they are now delighted with the leadership qualitied I am demonstrating. Their words, not mine. Take a look at it, I don't think I've ever seen a full bar of confidence as it's currently showing in the "Competitions" bar. I know I told them my expectations were for the club to make the playoffs but I guess they never thought fourteen games into the season we'd sit in first place, three full points clear of second place. That we were able to maintain this form with a squad as depleted as ours has been bodes really well for the rest of the season. Hopefully the guys coming back into the lineup will keep goign the same way as those who allowed us to have such good form.

Ocober 6, 2011
Youngster Sam Graham has begun full training following his thigh injury. Tendaya Darwika played in the second half of the Grimsby match. They're coming back! :)

October 8, 2011
It's Tyrone Thompson's turn to begin full training again. Chris Greenacre, Anwar Uddin and Reuben Noble-Lazarus are all only a few days away while Dominic Shimmin and Matt Somner are about ten days from coming back. It's all coming together people!

FM

[FrogMan]

October 8, 2011
We play 16th place Braintree opn their pitch. It's 0-0 at the half but we're barely surviving. Nobody's getting hot and we look like tourists out there. They put 7 of 10 shots on target in one half, that tells you something. We keep playing the same way in the second half and we can't escape this one. They put two past Richard Lee in the final 45 minutes. Final Score: 0-2.

A very disappointing result but something that had happened before when players who'd been away because injuries come back to the lineup.


October 10, 2011
Chris Greenacre resumes training and he's got a chip on his shoulder. When he got hurt, the media went into a mini frenzy and some people questioned if the 33yo would even have a spot in the starting eleven when he'd come back from his injury. I defended him in the media but Chris still want to prove to people that they were wrong to question his abilities.


October 12, 2011
It's all "woohoo" and "oh crap" in a matter of a few minute, albeit a minor "oh crap" to be honest. The "woohoo" is the fact that Anwar Uddin has resumed training, the minor "oh crap" comes with another injury, this time to Louis Briscoe. He will miss two months after twisting an ankle in training.

Grimsby finally play the game they had on hand over us and lose it! To Newport County, no joke! :) Following our latest loss, we're tied to Rushden in points and one ahead of Grimsby. We're six points safe into playoff contention.

FM

[FrogMan]

October 15, 2011
We play 7th place Hayes & Yeading at home. Shimmin and Somner are both a few days away from coming back. Pundits are saying they believe we should have too much quality for H&Y on our own pitch and we prove them right with a 3-0 first half lead. Despite a slight disadvantage in possession, we'd put 6 of 9 shots on target over the first 45 minutes. We go on to win it 4-1 on goals from Parker, Greenacre, Gilbert and Grimes. We completely took over possession of the ball in the second half.

Keigan Parker got the MoM.

FM

[FrogMan]

October 22, 2011
We play FC Halifax Town in the FA Cup Qualifying round 4. They play in the English Northern Premier League Premier Division. That's quite a mouthful there and according to this wikipedia page (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Premier_League_Premier_Division), it's apparently at level 7 of the England soccer system. The whole England system is presented here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_football_league_system) and according to that, the Blue Square Premier is at level 5. This gives you an idea of relative level between our two clubs. While my scout believe they will be no pushovers, the pundits believe we should have too much quality for them.

Grrr, Reuben Noble-Lazarus will be out of action for 2 weeks after suffering a stubbed to in training. Yeah right, he tripped and feel while coming out a bar is more like it...

Back in are Somner at DMC and Shimmin at DR.

Hrm, guys are complacent in the first half and we go down one goal twice in the half before pulling back. It's 2-2 at the break and I'm reasonably nervous at that point. Guys crank up the heat and we destroy them in the second half: Final Score 5-2.

We didn't allow them one shot, on target or not, for all of the second half. On the game, Nix had 2, Greenacre 1, Parker 1 and Grimes 1.

Interesting fact about Ashley Grimes whom my assistant said just a month ago that he wasn't one of the best forwards at the club. He's averaged a form rating of 7.62 in 8 appearances since joining us. He's also scored 5 goals and registered 2 assists in those 8 appearances. Oh, now my assistant says there isn't much difference between him and our other strong forward Chris Greenacre. Apparently now he is one of the best forwards at the club. :)

FM

[FrogMan]

October 29, 2011
We play 5th place Wrexham on their pitch. They're going through a run of good form right now and are evens favorites to win this one. We steal a point out of this one with a 1-1 draw. We never really controlled anything and a Keigan Parker goal just before then end of the first half was all we could muster. Still happy with the point.

November 1, 2011
The board are still delighted with the leadership qualities I'm demonstrating.

November 5, 2011
We play Billericay on their pitch in the first round of the FA Cup. They are currently playing in the Premier League of the Isthmian League which is a couple levels below us, i.e. right below the Conference Noth/South level.

We control the game from start to finish, just as I hoped we would. We're ahead 4-0 at the half and it ends with a final score of 5-0. We put 8 of 16 shots on target to their 2 out of 3. Parker got a couple goals while Owens, Grimes and centreback Chris Smith all got one a piece. Owens got the MoM and their keeper got a rating of 2. Yikes...

November 8, 2011
We play 19th place Accrington at home. We're quietly in control in this game and the 1-0 final score doesn't really represent how much more we controlled the flow of the game. The winning goal came from a Chris Greenacre header in the 24th minute. He also got the MoM.

November 12, 2011
Quick look at the league stats reveals that Graeme Owens and Chris Greenacre are 3rd and 4th in average form ratings with 7.64 and 7.62 respectively. Ashley Grimes and Keigan Parker come in 13th and 14th with averages of 7.55 and 7.53 respectively. Not too shabby. Parker is also the current top goal scorer of the league with 11. The closes to him has only 9. Greenacre is 8th with 5. Owens and Kyle Nix are 1st and 2nd in assists with 10 and 8 and Ashley Vincent is 7th with 5 assists himself. As a team, we're in 6th place for forms over the last 6 match.

We play 17th place Ebbsfleet on their pitch. A freakishly sad/unlucky showing. We went down 1 in the 13th minute and it looked like the guys stopped trying right there. Final score is a 0-2 loss but they only put 3 of 4 shots on target. Richard Lee ends the game with a form rating of 5.

November 19, 2011
We play 20th place Gateshead at home.

Before heading out to the field, I learn that Reuben Noble-Lazarus strained his neck in training and will miss a couple weeks. He's not played much wince all the guys got back from injury.

Yowza, what a first half we played today. We put 6 of 8 shots on target in the first 45 minutes and score 4 goals. We cool off a bit as I tell the guys to stop pressing in the second half but we save Richard Lee's clean sheet. Final Score: 4-0.

Chris Greenacre records a hat trick in the win while Keigan Parker score the fourth goal. Goes without saying that Greenacre also got the MoM.

Rushden won over Grimsby 4-3 and we're now sitting in second place.

FM

[FrogMan]

November 21, 2011
Hrm, Sam Graham will be out of action for about 3 weeks after hurting his foot in training. The kid's made out of silk paper, and it's not only my opinion but my physio's too. He tells me he has long term concerns over Graham's fitness...

Yeah, well, injuries come in twos I guess. Tendaya Darwika hurt his shoulder in training and will miss one month. Like I reported for Noble-Larazus earlier, Darwika has not seen the pitch much since all the forwards have come back from their injuries.

November 26, 2011
We play Burton on their pitch for our 2nd round FA Cup match. They are currently sitting in 4th place of League 2, this is gonna be one tough match, away no less.

And yeah, it's a tough one, but we pull away 1-0 in the 26th minute on a beautiful header of a corner by Chris Smith. We are being dominated though and even though we're still ahead by that one goal at the break, we're getting our hind parts handed to us. They're outshooting us 5 to 1 (4 to 1 on target) but that one shot from us gave us the lead.

They keep attacking some more and score an equalizer in the 54th minute. I was simply playing for the rematch at that point, until Byron Webster imitates Smith and heads one in from a corner kick in the 87th minute. We win it 2-1!

Webster is awarded the MoM. Let's say we stayed with them just enough to survive it and got lucky in the end. On to the 3rd round we go!

Oh wow, the draw for round 3 happens and we will be playing QPR at home on January 7. This'll be an emotional one for me. :)

November 29, 2011
We play 21st place York on their pitch. As much as we did just enough and got lucky against Burton, we don't do enough and are unlucky against York. We're ahead 2-0 after 34 minutes but it's even after 67. We even go down 2-3 in the 75th minute but Chris Greenacre puts us back in the game with a late goal in the 88th minute. Final Score: 3-3.

Blech, We had it so much in control in the first half and we let it get away. Owens got the MoM with a goal and Parker scored the other goal. Richard Lee again got rated at 5.

December 1, 2011
The board are still delighted with the leadership qualities I am demonstrating. The positive atmosphere in the changing room has been encouraging to them.

Chris Greenacre has won the Blue Square Premier Player of the Month award and the runner-up was none other than Graeme Owens. Well done guys!

I also see that Plymouth and Reading seem to be interested in Greenacre. Hrm, he's got a Big Club Release but I'd really hate to lose him in the January transfer window...

Looking around, I see that Matt Somner lists me has his favoured person. Sounds silly but I've always liked being listed like that. :)

December 3, 2011
We play 12th place Eastbourne Boro at home. It's one of those games where we can't do anything wrong. We're up 4-0 at the break with 59% possession and it ends with us winning 5-0 with 63% possession over the whole game, i.e. 67% for the last 45 minutes.

Our goalscorers were Kyle Nix, Keigan Parker and Byron Hart with one a piece and Chris Greenacre with two. It was Hart's first senior goal. Nix got the MoM.

Looking at the coach report for Hart, my assistant now lists him as the best young central midfielder at the club, ahead of Tendaya Darwika who is a high prize looanee. Potential ability ranked at four stars.

Rushden got manhandled by Wrexham, losing their game 3-0 and we move up to 2nd place.

FM

[FrogMan]

December 10, 2011
We play Hyde at home for our first round match in the FA Trophy. They play in the Blue Square North which is the level right under the Blue Square Premier.

Hrm, this one was more of a nailbiter than it should ever have been. We win it 2-1 after leading 2-0 for the first 82 minutes of the game. They just had too many clear chances to my liking in those last 10 minutes.

Keigan Parker and Chris Greenacre scored our goals, Parker getting the MoM. We'll play another Blue Square North side in the second round, Bishop's Stortford.

December 17, 2011
We play 17th place Gainsborough at home. This one starts ugly as we go down 0-1 in the 9th minute. A Chris Greenacre goal gets us back in the game in the 20th mintue but that was our first shot, on or off target. They'd already 3 of 4 on target by that time and were controlling the ball 64% of the time.

We do gain back possession the rest of the way and have quite a few chances but we fail to capitalize on them. Final Score: 1-1.

December 21, 2011
We play 6th place Cambridge. They've been absolutely on fire lately, recording a draw and five wins over the course of their last six games. We've gone WLWDWD, a bit less hot but still good enough for 8th in the league over the same period.

Ball control is our big weapon in this one as we're up 1-0 at the half with a nice 59% possession. We keep it going in the second half and add to our lead while maintaining the same kind of possession. Final Score: 2-0.

Tyrone Thompson scores in a rare start. Keigan Parker scores our second goal while also getting the MoM.

Rough news following the game though. Peter Gilbert had to leave the game after strainging an ankle. I learn afterward that he will miss about 2 months. Ouch... I'll see how Kevin Sandwith do in his absence and if he falters, I'll try Paul Stonehouse.

Today, we played the match we had on hand over Rushden. The win brings us to two points of them and the top spot in the league.

FM

[FrogMan]

December 26, 2011
We play 8th place Fleetwood on their pitch. It's a pretty even first half of play, both stats wise and score wise. It's 1-1 after 45 minutes and it looks like we're gonna get out of there with one point when they score in the 90th minute. DAMMIT!

That's a hard loss to take but we didn't deserve any better. We did just enough to survive all game long and got burned at the end.

Matt Somner scored our only goal and we drop to 3rd place as Grimsby jumps a couple spot to first place with a win. They're three points ahead of us with a match in hand.

December 28, 2011
We play 2nd place Rushden at home. Ugh, I hate these games with only 48 hours of rest. And against Rushden no less. If you go back and check, at the same time last season, we played Luton on only 48 hours of rest. Didn't go too well...

Looking at the squad, we got many players going into the game with their condition below 90%, something I try to avoid at all cost. Graeme Owens is alreayd at only 86%. Because of that, I give his first start ever to Byron Hart. Also in are Paul Stonehous and Gary Silk at DL and DR, Ashley Grimes for Keigan Parker at SC, Tyrone Thompson for Kyle Nix at AMC and Uddin for Matt Somner at DMC.

It's a crazy first half that goes back and forth. We scored twice, they scored twice, both keepers rated at 5 after 45, 2-2 is the score. Crazy...

We take control in the second half and Richard Lee is just not as awful as their keeper. He's still rated at 5 after 90 minutes but their keeper ends up with a 3. Final Score: 4-2

Huge, HUGE win! Ashley Grimes scored two, Reuben Noble-Lazarus had one as a replacement for Vincent late in the game and Byron Hart had one before coming out in the 61st minute. Vincent got the MoM.

This win against Rushden combined with a rare home loss by Grimsby means we're back at the top of the table! Grimsby still has a match on hand over us but this win was big.

FM

[FrogMan]

December 31, 2011
With the turn of the year come the reminders about all your players with contracts expiring in 6 months. Last year's list was huge. This year's, not so much. Only 6 players are on this list this season, apart from the loan players, and none is a regular starter. Here's the list:
GK Alan Marriott - not one appearance this year
DC Mark Preece - not one appearance this year
D LC Kevin Sandwith - currently replacing Peter Gilbert but otherwise expendable, 33yo
D/M LC Paul Stonehouse - see Sandwith but is only 24 so might be worthy of an offer on the cheap to be a backup
AM C Tyrone Thompson - used to be a regular last year but has barely played this season. Kyle Nix is much more dependable. 29yo

We play 8th place Barrow on their pitch. Greenacre comes into this game at only 85% condition so he'll sit to start the game. We struggle early on but score a couple to keep it under control and it's 2-2 at the half. It's frustrating that we let go of a 2-1 lead but even more that it's a penalty kick called in the 67th mintue that decides who wins. Final Score: 2-3.

Graeme Owens and Keigan Parker scored our goals.

Lucky for us, both Rushden and Grimsby lost their match so we remain in first place.

January 1st, 2012
The board remain delighted with the leadership qualities I am demonstrating.

While the January transfer window does open, I don't expect to make any acquisition this time around. First we're almost $3k over our weekly wage budget and because of that, our board is limiting me to wage offers of no more than $1.75k. Not many players of impact will come play for us at that price.

FM

[FrogMan]

January 3, 2012
We play 15th place Lincoln at home. Byron Webster is out for this game, having been suspended for a match with too many yellow cards. I move Dominic Shimmin back to DC and put Gary Silk in his DR spot. Shimmin has not been has impressive as I'd have hoped he would be, at least not a difference maker as other loanee Graeme Owens has been. Chris Greenacre played to finish our last game and his condition is still low. Thing is, Keigan Parker's condition is also pretty low. Good thing we're playing a lower quality opponent. I give a rare start to Reuben Noble-Lazarus.

I'm regretting this kinda lineup at the half. It's still 0-0 so we're not behind, but we've only targetted one ball on their keeper. We explode for two goals in a minute or so in the 66th minute and that's just enough to give us the win. Final Score: 2-0. Kidsters gave us that win as Byron Hart and Sam Graham both scored. Graham even got away with the MoM.

Grr, Shimmin left the game with an injury in the 84th minute. Turns out he will miss a couple weeks after twisting his knee.

Both Grimsby and Rushden won their respective games so nothing changes in the league table.

FM

[FrogMan]

January 7, 2012
We play Championship side Q.P.R. at home in this 3rd round FA Cup match. I have some history from another life with the club from Loftus Road and this match means a little something to me.

If you didn't know about my connection with QPR, feel free to read a bit :)
FM2005: a frog at Loftus Road - Front Office Football Central (http://www.osatwork.com/fofc/showthread.php?t=36109)
FM2005: a frog in the Premiership - Front Office Football Central (http://www.osatwork.com/fofc/showthread.php?t=37720)
FM2005: a frog in Europe - Front Office Football Central (http://www.osatwork.com/fofc/showthread.php?t=38582)
FM2005: Loftus Road to host Premiership football again - Front Office Football Central (http://www.osatwork.com/fofc/showthread.php?t=42650)
FM2005: European Football is back at Loftus Road! - Front Office Football Central (http://www.osatwork.com/fofc/showthread.php?t=43780)
FM2005: a frog at the World Cup? - Front Office Football Central (http://www.osatwork.com/fofc/showthread.php?t=44909)

My scout thinks that Q.P.R. will provide a difficult test and that retaining possession will be especially important. Yeah, duh, tell me something I DON'T know. Q.P.R. have been made 1-4 favorites to win this game by the bookies. Looking at the list of teams playing today, we're the only Blue Square Premier side left in the competition while there's still a Blue Square North club, Dover. Very impressed by that.

I decide to try and surprise QPR by going out attacking and well, it was not such a good idea. We're just not touching the ball. Possession is staying in th 30% area, but we've had some chances. We even take a 1-0 lead in the 41st minute on a Chris Greenacre goal but they even the score on a penalty just as the second half begins. Grrr... Come one guys, we can't be giving them goals! I only have time to catch my breath that we mount a push to their goal and it's his best impersonation of an NHL referee, the ref equalizes. PENALTY! Greenacre doubles his tally and we're back in the lead. We're still only registering 33% possession though, but they are not coming close to our net. I switch our formation to a defensive 5-3-2 formation and it does the trick just well enough for us to hang to our lead. Final Score: 2-1!!!

We've done it, we're through to round 4! I can't believe it!

This one is a huge morale booster in the dressing room.

January 8, 2012
Reuben Noble-Lazarus strained his neck in training and will miss 10 days.

January 10, 2012
I learn that we will play either League 2 Hereford or League 1 Brighton and Hove Albion in our 4th round FA Cup match. Interesting that we just beat a Championship club and would play lower clubs in the next round. Not saying it's a done deal we will advance, but we could, if we play it right.

FM

[FrogMan]

January 11, 2012
While looking at some scout reports for potential replacements for current keeper Richard Lee, I see that the scouted player is now being compared to Peter Donnelly. I mean, my scout is not saying the scouted player is "not anywher near", "as good as", or "better than" Richard Lee but than Petter Donnelly. Woah. Looking at his player card, it looks like the 19yo kid has grown a heck of a lot while on loan at Newport County. Despite conceding 61 goals in 25 appearances, he's averaged a form rating of 7.32, much better than Lee's 6.60. I decide to end Donnelly's loan and to recall him on the spot.

January 12, 2012
Oh crap, what I feared the most is happening. Plymouth Argyle have made a $110,000 bid for Chris Greenacre. Since they meet the criteria for the player's big club release clause, I cannot reject this offer. He accepts a $6.4k a week contract with them within the day. :(

I'm freakishly sad to see him go though, I can't lie. He was my first big transfer splash and he was a spark plug for our offense this season. He scored 7 goals in 18 appearances last season and had already score 16 in 22 appearances this season. Looking at his player card, not only does he lists me as his favoured person, he also admires me. I guess I gave him a second lease on life, so to speak.

Still, it's not all bad. I mean, Greenacre is 34 and we have some depth at the forward position. There's one thing though, even though I could not reject the offers, players are mad at me. Chris Smith, Kevin Sandwith, Ashley Vincent, Kyle Nix, Anwar Uddin, Paul Stonehouse and Louis Briscoe are all unhappy at the sale of one of the Club's star players. I COULD NOT REJECT IT!!!

FM

[FrogMan]

January 14, 2012
We play Bishop's Stortford in a 2nd Round FA Trophy match. Ashley Grimes gets the start for departed Chris Greenacre. Peter Donnelly is ineligible under competition rules since he's played a match in the FA Trophy with Newport County.

It's not one of our finest match. We go down 0-1 after only 11 mintues but tie it in the 36th minute. From then on, we attack off and on but I end up setting the guys to simply hold the draw so we'll play a rematch at home. Final Score: 1-1.

Keigan Parker scored our lone goal and Matt Somner got the MoM.

I learn that we will be playing Brighton and Hove Albion in the FA Cup 4th round. They destroyed Hereford 5-1 in a replay after drawing with them first 1-1.

FM

[FrogMan]

January 18, 2012
2nd Round FA Trophy replay match against Bishop's Stortford, on our pitch this time. This is more like it. We come out strong and control possession from the get go. It's 3-0 at the half and 4-0 after 90 minutes. Goals came from Matt Somner, Graeme Owens (pen), and Keigan Parker had two. We did lose two players to injury. Byron Webster will miss about a week after suffering a gashed lef and Ashley Vincent will be out of action for about three weeks with a twisted knee.

Matt Somner goes to the press and publicly thank me. He says he believes his wonderful form this season is due to the effect I have had on his career. Feels good to hear. :)

January 20, 2012
Huhoh, League 2 Brentford have come out and offered $80k for Kyle Nix. Like Greenacre, he too has the big club release clause but I guess Brentford is not a big enough club since I can negotiate. Silly me can't find a straight "reject" button but I follow my assistant's advice and nump up my demands to $900k for Nix. My assistant is of the opinion that Nix is a key player at the club who should be retained at all costs. I guess $900k would qualify for "at all costs". As expected, they drop their offer.

January 21, 2012
We play 22nd place AFC Telford at home. This game marks the senior debut of Peter Donnelly with us. We're totally in control in this game and the final score of a 2-1 win doesn't represent how we manhandled them. 57% possession with with shots going 11 to 12 (8 to 1 on target) is more representative. Keigan Parker and Sam Graham scored for us. Graeme Owens got yet another MoM playing the right wing. Youngster Byron Hart played the first 78 minutes on the left wing and got a rating of 8.

Grimsby also won while Rushden lost. We're moving up to second place, 4 points away from Grimsby but with a match on hand.

FM

[FrogMan]

January 24, 2012
We play 8th place Crawley on their pitch. Wow, what a counter performance Peter Donnelly gives us. I guess he is still very young at 19 and he will have bad games but this one is a really bad one. We end up with a 3-3 draw on at least 2 bad goals given by Donnelly. He ends the game on the bench with a form rating of 4.

Keigan Parker scored one and Kyle Nix scored two. Byron Hart ended up with the MoM in another strong showing.

Grimsby won and they pull away a bit more, now 6 points ahead of us. The scary thing is we're only one tiny points ahead of 5th place Cambridge who've been tearing the league up lately.

FM

[FrogMan]

January 25, 2012
Byron Webster has resumed training following his injury.

Thinking about making the team better for next season and our life post-Owens, remember that he is a loanee, I spot this 24yo AM RL named Dean Cox currently playing for Leyton Orient. I got some transfer money left and after a bit of back and forth, I get them to agree to an offer of $18k. My scout seems to think he is not good enough to succeed but his skills are just what I like in a winger, i.e. decent (12-13) crossing, dribbling, pace, stamina, passing, technique and teamwork. Yeah all those skills are either at 12 or 13 for him, plenty good enough for me. Add "movement", which I assume is the old "off the ball" skill, at 13 too. Sure, my scout is comparing him to Owens as our current best left midfielder. Owens is out of this world for a Conference level side. Even better, Cox is looking for only $1.65k a week on a 3 year deal. I go bit cheaper and offer him $1.5k a week with a $10k signing on fee. He agrees to the contract offered and joins us the very next day.

FM

[FrogMan]

January 28, 2012
We play Brighton at home for this 4th round FA Cup match. Peter Donnelly is again ineligible for this one so Richard Lee is back in the nets, and he delivers a stinker. Wow, we're with them all the way, controlling possession of 59% over the course of the whole game. Shots are also very even at 6 (3 on target) for us and also 6 (4 on target) for them. Still, Lee gets rated a wonderful 3 on form and we lose it 0-3.

Good thing it's not a league match and the impact is not as bad on player morale as the media and everyone pretty much expected us to lose. Still very frustrating to see we could have won this one, but a bad keeper performance denied us of that...

Following this second bad keeper performance in a row, by two separate keepers, I take this scout report I get about one 34yo Darryl Flahavan very seriously. My scout says he is twice the keeper that our best keeper Peter Donnelly is. Flahavan is without a contract and is looking for a one year deal at only $700 a week. He agrees to it and joins us as our fourth keeper. He could make for a solid keeper until the 19yo Donnelly matures a bit.

FM

[FrogMan]

January 31, 2012
Wow, while we were getting our butts handed to us in the FA Cup, it seems like everybody else around us in the league table have won their league game. Look at that, we're now in 6th place, only one points above the playoff line. Sure, we got two matches on hand but dang, this puts a lot of pressure on us to win those matches.

FM

[FrogMan]

February 1, 2012
Huhoh, since we're not as high on the league table, the board has kinda cooled off on their appreciation of my management of the club. They are not delighted anymore, simply very pleased with it.

The good news is that youngster Byron Hart has won the Blue Square Premier Player of the Month award. Wow, well done! I had not realized but since he's been a starter, the 18yo has had some very decent outings with form ratings of 7-8-9-7-8 over his last five appearances. Funny thing is the kiddo lists me as his favoured person. He's only four years older than my own son. Heck, he could be my son...

We play 13th place Kidderminster on their pitch. I give Donnelly another start at keeper and he again gives away a bad goal. He ends the game with a decent enough rating of 7 but a bad goal a game forces us to play way over our head defensively and even if it was a non-factor in this one as we won it 3-2, I simply don't like giveaway goals...

Byron Hart scored again along with Kyle Nix and Graeme Owens who also got the MoM. This was the only match in the league today and the win moves us back up to second place, 3 points away from first place Grimsby.

FM

[FrogMan]

February 4, 2012
We play Ebbsfleet in the 3rd round of the FA Trophy. They're also a Blue Square Premiere side. This is Darryl Flahavan's debut with us, as Donnelly is again ineligible for it. It's also Dean Cox's debut.

We can't seem to get anything going in this one, and when we can, we'Re offside. Seriously, we only put one of our two shots on target and were called for 11 offsides. They got called for only one. We playd badly. Final Score: 1-2

Byron Hart scored on our lone shot on target.

February 8, 2012
We play 6th place Kettering at home. Kettering are 4th in forms over the last six match while we come in 5th place. This one is more what I expect to see from this squad. From Graeme Owens's goal on a penalty in the 24th minute, through Ashely Grimes's assurance goal in the 61st minute, we quietly control the pace of the game. Final Score: 2-0.

A clean sheet for Flahavan who gets rated at 8. They did put 6 of 9 shots on target while we went 9 out of 10. Grimes gets the MoM.

This was our second match on hand over Grimsby and with a second win in two games, we move back up to the top spot in the league on goal differential! Not much room for error though as we're still only 4 points away from 6th place but a reasonable 7 points safe into the playoffs zone.

Oh, and the board are back to being delighted with my management of the club.

FM

[FrogMan]

This is interesting. Looking at how different we were performing at home and away, I suspected we had a better record at home than away, but it's usually like that anyway. What I didn't know was how much better than everyone else are at home and inversely how much worse we are than everyone else away from home. Here's the overall table.

FM

[FrogMan]

Here's the table for home games, teams again sorted byt the overall table rankings. We're in fact unbeaten at home in league play this season.

FM

[FrogMan]

Here's the table for away games, teams still sorted by the overall table rankings. Only 4 wins out of 15. Barrow's still worse than us though.

FM

[FrogMan]

February 11, 2012
We play 16th place Histon at home. They have a goal disallowed in the 22nd minute because of a offsides but otherwise we are in control of this game. We catch a break in the 42 minute when Graeme Owens scores on a penalty. It's only 1-0 for us at the half but it's not because of a lack of pressure on our part. We've put 5 shots out of 10 on target to their 1 out of 1.

Grrr, Dominic Shimmin again leaves a game, injured, in the 65th minute. Turns out he'll miss about 3 weeks with a thigh strain.

Keigan Parker adds to our lead with a late goal while Darryl Flahavan gets the clean sheet, scoring some points in the race to become our starting keeper. Final Score: 2-0.

Oooh, Grimsby and a red hot Wrexham side were battling it out on Wrexham's pitch and Wrexham won it 4-2. Wrexham move up to 2nd place, still 3 points behind us and we have a match on hand over them. Rushden drew while Cambridge won their match. It's gonna be a tight race over the last 13 matches of the season.

Wrexham are first in the league for form over their last 6 matches with 6 wins. We come in second with one draw and 5 wins and Cambridge are third with 4 wins and 2 draws. Grimsby have a two game losing streak.

FM

[FrogMan]

February 12, 2012
Ashley Vincent resumes full training following his knee injury. With the recent addition of Dean Cox, I now have two decent wingers to complement Graeme Owens, our one sure thing starter. Vincent has been with us a bit longer and has averaged 6.94 in form rating this season to Cox's 6.66 average form, albeit only on 5 appearances.

February 15, 2012
We play 10th place Tamworth on their pitch. We're 4-7 favorites to win this game but this being an away game, it makes me really nervous.

For today, Cox gets the left winger spot while Vincent will play up front, taking the spot of Keigan Parker who's seen his condition dip a bit. He's at 88% before the game has even started.

We start out slow, typical of our away games but then we turn the corner about half way through the firt half and we start playing with confidence, putting tons of shots on target, 9 out of 12 in 45 minutes to be exact. It's 1-0 after 45 and 2-0 after 90. Darryl Flahavan gets another clean sheet and Kyl Nix gets the MoM with our two goals.

Grimsby and Cambridge won and we're still in 1st place, 2 points aways from Grimsby.

FM

[FrogMan]

I like the 10 points we have on 6th place, with 12 games to play...

FM

[FrogMan]

February 18, 2012
We play 24th place AFC Wimbledon on their pitch. Interesting thing is that I remember seeing just a couple days agao that they just appointed a new manager. Ohter interesting thing, pundits only give us a slight advantage over Wimbledon. Compared to how they saw the previous game, this is kind of odd...

They have a goal disallowed because of a offsides early and for us, on the road, it qualifies as a big break. We tend to get down on ourselves when suffering an early goal, especially on the road.

We turn around and score within a minute of that disallowed goal and we never look back. Up 3-0 at the half, we win it 5-0 and it's a new record for biggesta away win in the Blue Square Premier. We completely dominated them and even though they tried mounting a bit of an offensive push, they pulled back about halfway through the second half, simply trying to survive. Byron Webster and Keigan Parker both scored a goal while Ashley Grimes had a hat trick in the win but didn't even get the MoM. Dean Cox
did, supplying 3 assists and playing very well on the left wing.

Wow, their keeper rated at 1 in form. I don't think I'Ve ever seen a player rated at 1 in a game before. Stinks to be him right now...

Both Grimsby and Wrexham won but Cambridge only drew. We remain three points ahead of Grimsby, now 6 points ahead of 3rd place Wrexham. Even better is that we're now 10 points above 5th place, not only 6th place...

Looking at league records, I see that we could be challenging Luton's record of 95 for most team goals in a season that they set last season. Darlington's record of 89 for most team points in a season is also reachable. We have 75 right now with 33 more points still in play...

FM

[FrogMan]

February 25, 2012
We play 23rd place Newport County at home. You'd expect some sort of domination from us but we're down 0-1 at the half. We completely shut them down in the second half though and win it 3-1.

Grimes, Parker, and Hart all scored a goal with Parker getting the MoM.

Matt Somner again tells the press that I'm in no small part the contributing factor to his excellent form this season.

March 1, 2012
I'm the runner-up for the Manager of the Month award. The manager of Wrexham won the award for February.

The board are still delighted with the leadership qualities I am demonstrating.

March 3, 2012
We play 2nd place Grimsby on their pitch. With only 10 games to play, that's a HUGE one.

They come out attack and we contain them and even get a 1-0 lead on a Kyle Nix goal in the 24th minute. We play it close the rest of the way and that goal is enough for us to win it 1-0.

Huge, HUGE win, especially on the road where we've struggled this season.

Matt Somner got the MoM with a rating of 9 and we pull away now 8 points ahead of new second place Wrexham.

FM

[FrogMan]

March 10, 2012
We play 18th place Braintree at home. Wow, we totally obliterate them right off the gates. It's 2-0 at the half but we've already put 7 of 10 shots on target while maintaining a 65% possession rate. We had a third goal at the start of the second half and they go ultra defensive from there on out. Final Score: 3-0.

Grimes, Webster and Parker are the scorers and Parker got yet another MoM.


March 17, 2012
We play 13th place Hayes & Yeading on their pitch. What a frigging stinker this is. They score two quick goals around the 15 minute mark and we never recover. I even pull out keeper Darryl Flahavan when he lets in a third goal in the 46th minute. Final Score: 1-3.

Flahavan finished this game rated at 4.

We now have an eight points lead over second place Wrexham but they do have a game on hand.

AFC Wimbledon have officially been relegated from the Blue Square Premier.

March 21, 2012
3rd place Grimsby and 2nd place Wrexham both play and win the match they each had on hand over us. They are now both only five points behind us with seven gamaes to play.

FM

[Marc Vaughan]

Well, it was no joke. Ryan Williams has retired and we've got nobody to man the right wing. Current wage total is at $22,951

In case you weren't aware for the future one of the more obscure additions in the last update was the ability to appeal against retirements - to do this click on the players retirement message (ie. where it says he's retiring on his profile).

[Marc Vaughan]

We play Brighton at home for this 4th round FA Cup match. Peter Donnelly is again ineligible for this one so Richard Lee is back in the nets, and he delivers a stinker. Wow, we're with them all the way, controlling possession of 59% over the course of the whole game. Shots are also very even at 6 (3 on target) for us and also 6 (4 on target) for them. Still, Lee gets rated a wonderful 3 on form and we lose it 0-3.
Bear in mind that Brighton have a VERY strong team and irl are still in the FA Cup having just turfed out Championship side Watford (we're also top of our division with games in hand).

[Marc Vaughan]

The good news is that youngster Byron Hart has won the Blue Square Premier Player of the Month award. Wow, well done! I had not realized but since he's been a starter, the 18yo has had some very decent outings with form ratings of 7-8-9-7-8 over his last five appearances. Funny thing is the kiddo lists me as his favoured person. He's only four years older than my own son. Heck, he could be my son...

Heh - in case you aren't aware one of the 'unlockables' in the game is actually you having a son promoted into your youth team ..... but you've a way to go before getting that yet ;)

[Marc Vaughan]

PS - Hope you cling on for the automatic promotion spot, in some ways getting out of the BSP is one of the harder challenges as there is just the one spot for automatic promotion available ...

[FrogMan]

In case you weren't aware for the future one of the more obscure additions in the last update was the ability to appeal against retirements - to do this click on the players retirement message (ie. where it says he's retiring on his profile).

Good to know. As I'm sure you've read after that retirement, Williams was replaceable after all... :)




Bear in mind that Brighton have a VERY strong team and irl are still in the FA Cup having just turfed out Championship side Watford (we're also top of our division with games in hand).

So, more a case of the stats being somewhat equal but them getting much better chances and thus overwhelming my keeper. Interesting, although it still felt flat following our win over QPR...


Heh - in case you aren't aware one of the 'unlockables' in the game is actually you having a son promoted into your youth team ..... but you've a way to go before getting that yet

Yeah, I think I had read that somehwere. Interesting. :)


PS - Hope you cling on for the automatic promotion spot, in some ways getting out of the BSP is one of the harder challenges as there is just the one spot for automatic promotion available ...

Can only ask you to keep on reading... ;)

But I agree, the lone auto promotion spot is a tough spot.

FWIW, season is over, will hopefully report the rest of it over the rest of the day or tomorrow...

FM

[FrogMan]

March 25, 2012
We play 2nd place Wrexham at home. Talk about another HUGE game for us! We come out strong in the first half but fail to score and it's still 0-0 at the half. We're awarded a penalty in the 62nd minute and after scoring on the kick, we had a second goal a minute later. They do claw one back in the 78th minute but it's too little too late for them. Final Score: 2-1.

Grimsby won their match so we're really one pulling away from one of the two clubs tied for 2nd place.

March 28, 2012
Grr, Dominic Shimmin is injured again! He will miss three weeks after twisting his knee in training.


March 31, 2012
Receiving a few reminders of players with only three months left on their contract. GK Alan Marriott, DL Kevin Sandwith, AMC Tyrone Thompson, DL Paul Stonehouse, DC Mark PreeceSC Conor Higginson will probably all end up free agents at the end of June. D/DM R Dale Knight, a product of our youth squad last season, is the only player I offer a contract to.

We play 19th place Accrington on their pitch. Hrm, rough game for us which is almost expected on the road. We end up winning is 1-0 but were outclassed on almost all statistical categories.

Byron Webster headed in our only goal and Darryl Flahavan got the MoM with a clean sheet after facing 11 shots on target.

Grimsby won so we're still only 5 points ahead of them.

Newport County have been relegated from the Blue Square Premier

Woohoo, that win has assured us of one thing: we have locked in a playoff spot. No matter how hard we crumble, if we do, I'm sure that I'll have delivered what I promised!

FM

[FrogMan]

April 1, 2012
I have won the Blue Square Premier Manager of the Month award and the board are still delighted with the leadership qualities I am demonstrating.

April 3, 2012
Dale Knight, who is now presented as the strongest right back on the squad, ahead of Gary Silk, has agreed to a new contract.

April 5, 2012
We play 10th place Ebbsfleet at home. We already have a 2-0 lead in the 34th minute when one of their defenders gets sent off for a professional foul within their penalty area. It's get real ugly for them from there on out. from 4-0 at the half, we push it to 6-0 after 90 minutes.

We put 14 of 15 shots on target while keeping them to only 1 shots on target. We also controlled the ball 63% of the time. Keigan Parker had a hat trick and more, finishing the match with 4 goals in the win and Ashley Grimes scored the other two.

Once again, Grimsby equaled us and won. We're still 5 points ahead of them with only four to play.

We've now broken 4 league records this season: most team points in a season (93 so far), most team goals in a season (102 so far), biggest home win (this match, 6-0) and biggest away win (5-0 over AFC Wimbledon back in February).

April 14, 2012
We play 22nd place Gateshead on their pitch. Just like in our last game, our opponents see one of their players being sent off in the 15th minute. We don't take big advantage of the extra payer, or at least we use it just enough to squeak by and win it 1-0.

Really not an impressive win, but a win is a win, and for us, that's even more important for road games.

Grimsby destroyed Rushden 3-0 at home and remain only 5 points behind us with now only 3 matches to play. What's surprising to me is how far Rushden have fallen. They were once challenging for the league title and are now in 7th place.

FM

[FrogMan]

April 21, 2012
We play 5th place Cambridge on their pitch. This is another big one for us.

Grr, Dean Cox has to leave the match because of an injury in the 13th minute. He's played really well lately on the left wing.

We're in a rough spot at the half, down 1-3, but we play our way back into the game in the second. It's not pretty but we end up drawing with Cambridge, 4-4. Four difference scorers on each side. For us, it's Grimes, Owens, Parker and Nix. Nix scored the equalizer in the 90th minute.

Grimsby won and they are now only three points behind us...

Dean Cox will miss 2 weeks atfer suffering a stubbed toe. We got depth on the wings, hopefully we won't suffer too much and we won't have to play through the playoffs...

FM

[FrogMan]

April 23, 2012
Always on the lookout for potential addition to the team, I see 29yo forward Rowan Vine who's currently without a contract. The name's familiar to me from my time at QPR in another life. My scout thinks he is better than our current best striker Keigan Parker. The good news is that Vine is not too greedy. He's only looking for a weekly wage of $1.45k. I try to get him cheaper at $1.35k a week and he agrees.

With the kind of dribbling, technique, shooting, creativity and decision skills he's got, he could very well be our Chris Greenacre for next season...

FM

[FrogMan]

April 24, 2012
We play 22nd place York at home. Vine gets the start, relegating Parker to the bench. Parker has had some bad forms in the last few games while Ashly Grimes has been rock steady. The move pays off in the 28th minute as Vine scores in his debut. Graeme Owens will add to our lead at the start of the second half and we win it 2-0.

We had to win this one, as Grimsby also won. We're only three points ahead of them and while it's not made official, we have such a better goal differential that we should clinch the league title whatever happens in the last match.

April 25, 2012
The board are delighted with the leadership qualities I'm demonstrating but they add that despite the positives, the club's wage expenditure is still too high. Vine's contract, even though small compared to others at the club, is what pushed the total. I terminate Dominic Shimmin's loan deal and release Mark Preece and Tyrone Thompson on free transfer. All of these moves bring us back under the wage budget.

FM

[FrogMan]

April 28, 2012
We play 14th place Eastbourne Boro on their pitch. It's a struggle early on and we're tied 1-1 at the half. Grimsby are winning their game and a draw has us one points ahead of them.

NOOOOO! The ref awards them a penalty to start the second half and we go down 1-2. We never make it back.

It takes a couple seconds to sink in. Grimsby and us are tied in first place but our goal differential is better at 57 vs 51 for them! WE'VE WON THE LEAGUE TITLE. WE'RE MOVING UP TO LEAGUE 2!!!!!! ROCK ON!!!

The supporters are singing my name! The board are delighted and they say that credit must go to me for making this all possible. WOOHOO!

May 1, 2012
Graeme Owens has won the Blue Square Premier Player of the Month award.

May 5, 2012
Grimsby and Cambridge are tied 3-3 after first leg of the first playoffs semi final and Crawley are leading Wrexham 4-2 in the other semi final.

FM

[Marc Vaughan]

Woo Hoo - congrats on winning the photo finish - nice one :D

[terpkristin]

Lots of updates today! Did somebody have a day off? ;)

Congrats on the league title! :)

/tk

[FrogMan]

Woo Hoo - congrats on winning the photo finish - nice one :D

thanks, sure got me nervous at the end. Didn't help that I didn't realize our goal differential was so much better only until the end of our last game... ;)

FM

[FrogMan]

Lots of updates today! Did somebody have a day off? ;)

Congrats on the league title! :)

/tk

nah, just a diligent use of off time and coffee/lunch breaks. I type my updates in notepad, using lots of screenshots to remember what happened, and I post in bursts. I had something like 400 screenshots on my Touch for yesterday's updates. Actually didn't use them all yesterday, was up to the first friendly of the new season in playing time. New players are coming to town! More to come today. :)

Thanks for reading!

FM

[FrogMan]

Graeme Owens has won the Blue Square Premier Player of the Year award. Runner-Up was Keigan Parker. Wow, talk about a one-two punch!

Booooo, Ian Sampson of Grimsby has won the Blue Square Premier Manager of the Year award. I was the runner-up. I guess they were not expected to compete or something like that. Still, I got the ti-tle, na-na-na-na-na... :p

An odd little news tidbit comes up, maybe Marc can explain it. Subject is: "Loan restrictions to be abolished?" and the text goes: "In a radical shake-up of the current loan rules, the restrictions on loan transfers may be lifted." I'm not sure I understand the implications of such a news. You could loan as many players as you want? Or the loan windows would be abolished?

May 20, 2012
Wrexham and Grimsby play each other in the playoffs final and Wrexham win it 4-3. They will move up to League 2 with us.

May 26, 2012
Wow, Luton is playing in the League 2 playoff final. They lose is 0-3 to Northampton so we'll have a shot at playing them twice next season. I wonder if my board could have a "finish higher than Luton" line in the seasons expectations screen. I'd go for that and would be happy... :)

June 9, 2012
The season is officially over. Keigan Parker is the top goal scorer in the Blue Square Premier with 27 goals. That'S 10 more than the second best goal scorer, with whom Ashley Grimes is tied in 2nd place with 17 goals. Kyle Nix is tied for first in assists with 17.

The team's board of directors give us their initial expectations. They expect us to fight bravely against relegations this season. I tell them we WILL stay clear of relegation. The difference is small in budget, from $12k to $12.5k in transfer budget and from $30,459 to $31,993 in weekly wage budget. The next step would have been to promise a respectable league position and I just can't promise that in our first year up. Difference would have been about another $1500 in weekly wage budget.

Our current wage total is at $26,334 but that includes some dead weight that will leave when their contracts are over at the end of the month.

I circle a couple dates on our lixt of fixtures: October 13 and March 2. On these days, we will play Luton Town. First is away, second is at home.

FM

[FrogMan]

July 1, 2012
My first move as the transfer/loan window reopens is to try and get Graeme Owens back on another year long loan. Kilmarnock shoot me down, they now see Owens as an important first team player. Was worth a shot anyway.

July 7, 2012
Wingers Stephen Pearson and Danny Schofield are our first two new players in this offseason. Pearson is 29 and can play either the AMC spot or man the left wing. With pretty good pace and passing, he is seen as being as good as our current best left winger, Dean Cox. We got him to sign for us for $2600 a week. It's a two year deal.

I offer Danny Schofield a contract mostly because he came in cheap and accepted my offer at only $1250 a week. He's a straight left winger and will not the field much. At 32, I don't think I will renew his contract once his year with us is over.

FM

[FrogMan]

And here's Schofield's player card.

FM

[FrogMan]

July 10, 2012
Ivan Sproule is our third newest player. Described by my scout as being "a lot better than" our best right winger Ashley Vincent, the 31yo agrees to a one year deal worth $1500 a week which is fairly cheap. The guy is blazing fast and really aggressive.

FM

[FrogMan]

July 11, 2012
An enquiry to Crewe Alexandra leads us to the signing of a fourth players, a 27yo D LC named Jake Buxton. Crewe Alexandra told me that he was surplus to the requirements and that they would allow him to move for free if we could get him to signa contract with us. He wants $2400 a week but I offer him $2000 with a tiny signing on fee and he agrees to come play with us. He's not that impressive but I like that he can play both the center and the left side of the defence.

FM

[FrogMan]

July 21, 2012
We play Altrincham in a friendly match. They are currently in the Blue Square Premier. The final score of 1-0 in our favor doesn't really represent how much stronger we looked on the pitch. 63% possession tells a better story. Ashley Vincent scored our only goal.


July 28, 2012
We play Blue Square Premier side Ebbsfleet in a friendly match at home. Trying to decide what he's worth, I give Paul Donnelly the start in nets. Ugh, this is not pretty. The team plays well. We outshoot them 12 to 2 (6 to 2 on target) but end up stuck in a 2-2 tie. Donnelly gave up to stupid goals and ended up rated at 5. Rowan Vine and Kyle Nix scored our goals.

August 1, 2012
We play Championship side Doncaster at home in our last friendly. We are dominated and finish the game with our lone shot going on target, and at least behind the keeper. Final Score: 1-1.

Let's say we stayed in survival mode in this one, but Doncaster are two levels above us...

Coming up: THE 2012-113 SEASON!!!

FM

[FrogMan]

Squad review
We go into this season a bit thin at defense but otherwise with what I think is a good group of players. Here's the squad we have heading into the new season.

GK: Darryl Flahavan, Peter Donnelly, Richard Lee
Donnelly has disappointed me in the friendlies. He did play better in the third than in the second but he's prone to letting in some ugly goals from time to time and I can't have that. My assistant's assessment of Donnelly's value is now that he is unlikely to have enough potential to succeed at the club...

DR: Gary Silk, Dale Knight
Ugh, still stuck with Silk. Can't believe I've not found a replacement yet. Don't think Knight will ever be good enough to take over.

DL: Peter Gilbert, Jake Buxton
Pretty much status quo from last season.

DC: Byron Webster, Jake Buxton, Chris Smith, Anwar Uddin
VERY thin at that spot. Really need to adress that soon.

DMC: Matt Somner, Anwar Uddin, Sam Graham
Somner was great for us last year and Uddin was serviceable as his backup. Graham is an odd one. Primary position is SC but he is also able to play the DMC spot.

AMC: Kyle Nix, Stephen Pearson, (able to play position: Keigan Parker, Ashley Vincent, Ashley Grimes, Luis Briscoe)
Nix was outstanding for us in that spot last year. Pearson could possible challenge him, or indeed give him a breather when schedule congestion will occur.

ML: Dean Cox, Byron Hart, Stephen Pearson, Danny Schofield
Cox also played really well for us in that spot last year. Hart did well in most games he came in as a sub and Pearson could certainly be a starter in case of injury to Cox. Schofield is the insurance policy in case of injury rash like we had last year.

MR: Ivan Sproule, Ashley Vincent (able to play the position: Dean Cox, Keigan Parker, Louis Briscoe)
I hope Sproule will do a bit better than what Vincent did last year. Not that Vincent was bad, but he was a bit inconsistent. Sure, we had Graeme Owens last season so that wasn't as big a deal. Worse comes to worse, I could always move Dean Cox to the right side and start Pearson on the left if I wanted to shake things up.

SC: Rowan Vine, Keigan Parker, Ashley Grimes, David Middleton, (deep backups: Ashley Vincent, Sam Graham, Louis Briscoe)
A very strong front three headed by Vine whom I hope for bigs things this season. Given his skill set, he could be as big as Chris Greenacre was for us in the first half of last season.

Well, here they are, your 2012-13 Stags!

Now that I think about it though, there has not been one player to graduate from our youth squad this season. This seems odd, although possible. I guess not all season will produce three players like we saw last year...

FM

[FrogMan]

August 4, 2012
The 2012-13 season is finally here!!!

We open the season on the road, playing Macclesfield. Interesting thing, we're allowed to carry on 7 subs going into games with the right of using 3 of them. That's different from the conference leve where you can use 3 out of 5 from your bench. I like being able to have 7 different players on my sideline.

Wow, we open it up real strong, putting pressure on their backline early on in the game. We're ahead 1-0 at the half on a Byron Webster header of a corner kick. Shots and possession are in our favor though. It's more of the same in the second as we shut them down of any opportunity on goal. Final Score: 1-0.

The ice has been broken, we win to open our life in League 2!

FM

[FrogMan]

August 8, 2012
We play Championship side Wigan in the first round of the League Cup. I see that they have a few players unavailable due to being on international duty. Kyle Nix is unavailable for us due to the same reason. Well, this turns into a bloodbath. We'Re down 0-4 at the half and it ends with us losing it 0-6. Ugh... :(

Flahavan gets rated at 4 for this ugly game but the poor sap couldn't do anything as they put 13 of 15 shots on target. One can only hope our team morale will not be affected too much by such a disgusting defeat.

August 10, 2012
Blech, Anwar Uddin will be out for about a month after spraining an ankle in training.

Oh crap, Jake Buxton also got injured in today's training session. He will miss about 3 weeks with a twisted knee. Time to seriously shop for some defenders...

August 11, 2012
Okay, this one came out of nowhere. League 1 Portsmouth offer me $120k for keeper Peter Donnelly. Since they meet the criteria of the player's big club release clause, I cannot reject this offer. Honestly, I would have accepted it anyway, especially after the craptastic goals he's let in the few times I've let him play.

We play Aldershot at home. They also won their first match 1-0. We again control play in this game, not allowing them anywhere near our keeper. It's 0-0 at the half but their keeper comes a bit too far out on a corner kick in the 76th minute and Keigan Parker makes him pay. Final score: 1-0.

Byron Webster got the MoM which makes me feel a bit better about our defense although Buxton's replacement, Chris Smith only got rated at 6.

We're one of only two clubs to have won their two matches so far this season.

August 13, 2012
It's done, Peter Donnelly has accepted a contract offer from Portsmouth and he joins them. This gives us more money than I'd ever have hoped to get for what I practically considered a shaky backup. Niiiiiiiiiice!

With that $120k and the original $10k my board was allowing me, I now have $130k to find some better defenders.

So far, the players I do find are either out of price or don't want to drop down to a lower division once a transfer has been agreed to.

FM

[FrogMan]

August 16, 2012
I take a shot at signing a centreback before my scout has given me his opinion. The guy is Wayne Thomas, a 33yo DC who's played at some good level but is currently without a contract. He's looking for $2.4k a week but I offer him a one year deal worth $1.9k a week. He agrees and joins us. I like his overall skill set. He's got great leadership, aggression and is VERY strong. He also had good tackling and plays well as part of a team. My assistant seems him as close in skill to our other good central defender, Byron Webster. I'm really happy to welcome him to Mill Hill.

Not sure I've ever mentioned it but Mill Hill is the name of our ground. :)

With $130k in transfer budget, I take a shot at signing Graeme Owens. No dice, Kilmarnock won't let him go. I know we don't really need another winger, but it was worth a shot.


FM

[FrogMan]

August 18, 2012
We play Morecambe on their pitch. They're currently in 20th place after losing their first two games, albeit both by the identical score of 0-1.

We struggle to retain possession of the ball in this one but we do attack, early and often. Keigan Parker scores two and we get back home with a 2-0 win in our back pocket. We put all 10 of our shots on target, an awesome feat.

Rowan Vine got the MoM with a rating of 9 and an assist on each of Parker's goals.

Wow, a three game winning streak to open the season is way better than anything I'd ever expected. Guys are playing great right now.

FM

[FrogMan]

August 20, 2012
Still shopping for defenders, I spot this 28yo D RLC transfer listed by Plymouth, Lee Beevers. My scout seems to think he is a much better right back than our current best right back, Gary Silk. His skill set isn't that impressive, but still not all bad. I enquire to Plymouth about how much they want for the defender valued at $120k. They surprise me and say $52k which I offer them. True to their words, they accept and I get to negotiate for a contract with Beevers. Ugh, he is looking for a bit more money than we can give. He wants $3.8k a week and my board won't allow me to offer more than $2.6k. Thing is, he's currently earning only $1.35k week so maybe doubling his current wage will be enough for him, who knows...


August 23, 2012
A couple days have passed and Lee Beevers calls me back. He's accepted our contract offer and will come play for us! As you can see, he's not real impressive on paper but he can play all three defensive spots and I'm sure he'll be able to do better than Silk. Or at least I hope so.

This last signing puts us $2300 over our weekly wage budget so I guess I'm done with bringing in any new player, unless I can get rid of some dead weight, but even then, the ones I have in mind (Briscoe, Silk, Knight, Middleton) are all earning less than $1000 a week. Silk is at $1150 a week but the next highest is Knight at $500 a week...

Switching the $72k left from the transfer budget to the wage budget would give me back maybe about $1300. I do that and I'm now only $1000 a week over the budget...

FM

FM

[FrogMan]

should add the interesting fact that the state of our finances is now "Okay". It had been at a red "Insecure" ever since I took over as manager of the club. That's gotta be positive, right?

FM

[FrogMan]

August 25, 2012
I'm getting a bit over the wage budget but the injury to Anwar Uddin has made me nervous about the DMC spot. Robert Milson is a 25yo DM C with an interesting set of skills. My scout seems to think there's not much difference between him and our best central midfielder, Stephen Pearson. Milson could come to us for cheap, only asking for $750 a week. I offer him that for two years and he accepts within the day. He'll be Matt Somner's primary backup and could see playing time at the end of games, just like Anwar Uddin did most of last season.

To free some money under the wage budget, I decide to bite the bullet and pay $20k to release Louis Briscoe on a free transfer.

We play 1st place Bury at home. This is our biggest match yet and short as calling it a must win only 3 games into the season, it's as close as it can be.

Lee Beevers makes his debut at right back in this game. It's a very close first half in which we looked a bit overwhelmed early on. We let one in at the 31 minute mark and will not recover. Final Score: 0-1.

Arg, tough one to take as we really put a lot of pressure on their back line in the last 45 minutes. Their keeper pulls of an amazing performance, getting the clean sheet and the MoM in the process.

Still, this game showed me we belong to this level of play. Sure, we will lose close ones, but we'll also win some and as long as morale stays decent, we shoul be able to stave off relegation.

FM

[FrogMan]

August 30, 2012
With the transfer window about to close, I keep seeing players that are more interesting than what we have on hand. Strangely enough, just like Milsom was, these are mostly players currently without contract. Latest one is 24yo AM/F RC Lewis Grabban whom my scout seems to think could have the potential to be a key member of our first-team squad. He adds that he is a lot better than our best forward Rowan Vine. He's looking for $1.6k a week and I know I'm over my wage budget so I try to get him cheap. A first offer at $1k a week is rejected but he agrees to a $1.1k a week offer, sweetened with a $15k signing on fee for two years. He's got pretty good pace, movement and dribbling. Hopefully he can create opportunities for others if he cannot bangs 'em in with a very average shooting skill.

As he shows up to the club house, my assistant tells me he thinks he is now the best forward at the club. He's also a bit younger than some of my other signings.

We're now back at $2755 over our weekly wage budget...

August 31, 2012
I agree to let David Middleton go on a season long loan to Barrow. They won't pay his wages but he's only earning $260 a week.

FM

[FrogMan]

September 1, 2012
The board are satisfied with my management of the team. I don't remember how it was in the PC version but in the iOS version, the satisfaction level of your board resets at the start of every season. Right now, they note the the positive atmosphere amongst the players as being a contributing factor to their satisfaction. I'm sure if we dip a bit lower in the standings that my control of wages will come back to bite me.

We play 14th place Yeovil at home. I juggle with it quite a bit but end up starting Rowan Vine and newcomer Lewis Grabban at the striker spots. It's not up front that we seem to have trouble though as Darryll Flahavan has a rough game. We en up losing it 0-2 and he gets rated 5 for form. We definitely could have, maybe should have won this game. It was at home and we ended putting 11 of 13 shots on target to their 5 out of 6.

Grabban rated at 8 and Vine at 7 so they were definitely not the problem...

September 4, 2012
Jake Buxton resumes training following his knee injury. Thing is, I'm not even sure I have a spot in the startting eleven for him anymore. Wayne Thomas has played quite well with Byron Webster in the centreback spot. Will have to see,,,

September 8, 2012
Anwar Uddin resumes training following his foot injury.

We play 3rd place Chesterfield on their pitch. We're currently in 5th place with 3 wins and 2 losses. Grrr, this game starts without us in it. I mean, a goal in the 5th minute is bad but when you have only 25% possession in the first 20 minutes, it's REALLY not good. We get back into it a bit but they add a second goal in the final moments of the game and Flahavan again gets rated at 5. Final Score: 0-2.

Ugh, 3 wins in a row followed by 3 losses in a row. Gotta try to stop that skidding. We're still in a nice 10th place overall and I am reminded by looking at the league table that only the bottom two clubs are relegated.

FM

[FrogMan]

September 15, 2012
Ugh, our top centreback Wayne Thomas will miss about a month after injuring his shoulder in training. Kinda lucky for us Buxton just got back.

The press are questioning whether Thomas will be able to regain his starting spot after recovering from his injury. I defend him and issue a press release stating that Thomas still has a lot to offer us. In a private meeting, Wayne thanks me as he acknowledges my support.

We play 3rd place Gillingham at home. We are in 10th place and lately it seems we're always playing teams in the top 3...

It's a scoreless first half in which we control play quite well. We put 5 of 6 shots on target while they did not even have one attempt, on or off target, but they hit bullseye on their first attempt only 2 minutes into the second half. Rowan Vine gets us back to level terms in the 66th minute and Robert Milsom, put in at the half in the spot of Matt Somner, even gives us the lead in the 71st minute with a nice goal. We relapse and let them back in only 3 minutes later. Final Score: 2-2.

Kinda disappointing but we at least stopped the losing streak. Vine got the MoM while Flahavan had yet another disappointing performance. We drop to 11th place with the draw.

The board now feel I should be performing slightly better. They point the recent poor form of the team as being a great cause of concern but the positive atmosphere amongst the player is at least a saving grace. If I can keep the player in good morale, we could achieve nice things once they all gel...

FM

[FrogMan]

September 22, 2012
We play 9th place Torquay on their pitch. We start this one strong and all the action apparently happened in the first half. Three goals, two for us. Final Score 2-1.

A win road is always nice.

Stephen Pearson who is now starting in Kyle Nix's AMC spot scored the first and Lewis Grabban scored the other. Nix was really struggling to pull out his usual stead performances of the Blue Square Premier. I guess the opposition is a bit tougher in League 2. Grabban is also one of our new starters, taking over for Keigan Parker who, while he had scored 3 in 5 appearances, was really streak and averaged a form rating of only 6.20.

We're now in 9th place after 8 games played.

FM

[FrogMan]

September 25, 2012
We play 14th place Stockport at Mill Hill. It's a very even first half but we come out ahead by one on another Stephen Pearson goal. We do explode in the second half and completely take control of the game while shutting them down to only one good chance. Final Score: 2-0.

Again, Lewis Grabban scored the second goal. Ivan Sproule got the MoM. I'm happy he seems to be breaking out of his shell a bit. Darryl Flahavan finally has a nice game, rating at 8 with a clean sheet.

We move up to 7th place and in a playoff spot with the win!

September 29, 2012
Hrm, this is interesting. Ever since joining the club, old man Flahavan had been listed as the best keeper at the club by my assistant. I guess his age - he is 35 now - might be finally catching up with him because now Richard Lee is listed as the best keeper at the club by my assistant while Flahavan is described as "a useful backup". This might be in line with the kind of shaky performances Flahavan has given us so far this season. I will start Richard Lee in the nets for our next match.

We play 6th place Hereford on their pitch. They are just one tiny point ahead of us.

Grr, they start the game on the attack and we don't react well to it, letting one in only 3 minutes into the game. Lewis Grabban sees one goal being disallowed for being offsides in the 17th minute but he is so dominating that he ends up scoring two within the next 15 minutes. It's 2-2 at the half and that's when we take control of the game. Stephen Pearson scores what would be the winning goal in the 67th minute and Robert Milsom adds one to really put the game away in the 90th minute. Final Score: 4-2.

We really turned it on in the last 45 minutes, sometimes having streaks at 75% possession. Grabban gets the MoM and Richard Lee does okay.

We move up ahead of Hereford with the win, up to 6th place. We're within 3 points of second place.

FM

[Marc Vaughan]

An odd little news tidbit comes up, maybe Marc can explain it. Subject is: "Loan restrictions to be abolished?" and the text goes: "In a radical shake-up of the current loan rules, the restrictions on loan transfers may be lifted." I'm not sure I understand the implications of such a news. You could loan as many players as you want? Or the loan windows would be abolished?

This is one of the games 'unlockables' - there are a fair few of them hidden in there (this one is triggered by a loan player winning an award). Some of them are short-term effects (ie. the 'owe you one' unlockable gurantee the board accepting a request) whereas some like this affect the actual rules involved in the game/league you're in.

This one will remove any numeric restrictions on loans so you won't be capped capped at 'x' players per season or whatever.

(I quite like these sort of things myself and feel they change the dynamic of the game and the challenge involved somewhat - making things 'interesting' especially for experienced players - please note all are 'optional' in nature, you can decline them)

[FrogMan]

October 2, 2012
Lewis Grabban came in as runner-up for the League 2 Player of the Month award.

Today, we have a second round match in the Jonhstone's Paint Trophy and we face League 1 Walsall at Mill Hill.

I was a little nervous at the start of the game, being that we were playing a team one level higher than us, and these apprehensions get worse when we go down 0-1 after only 14 minutes. We do pick ourselves up and score twice before the end of the half and are ahead 2-1 after 45 minutes. Rowan Vine and Stephen Pearson were the scorers there.

Lewis Grabban gives us a two goal lead in the 64th minute but we're hanging by very little. They are a stronger club than we are and it shows a little. They take one back in the 79th minute and I tell the guys to go ultra defensive. We hold on to our lead for a 3-2 win. Well done guys!

Vine gets the MoM and their keeper gets rated at 4.

We will play League 1 Carlisle in the Jonhstone's Paint Quarter Final on November 6.

Next up in league play is a game I'm really looking forward to. We will visit Luton at Kenilworth Road. They are currently in 11th place.

FM

[FrogMan]

I had typed the update above last Friday but forgot to post it. I may streamline my updates today since I played a great bunch of games over the weekend...

And by a bunch, I mean up to January 23, 2013 or so... :)

FM

[FrogMan]

This is one of the games 'unlockables' - there are a fair few of them hidden in there (this one is triggered by a loan player winning an award). Some of them are short-term effects (ie. the 'owe you one' unlockable gurantee the board accepting a request) whereas some like this affect the actual rules involved in the game/league you're in.

This one will remove any numeric restrictions on loans so you won't be capped capped at 'x' players per season or whatever.

(I quite like these sort of things myself and feel they change the dynamic of the game and the challenge involved somewhat - making things 'interesting' especially for experienced players - please note all are 'optional' in nature, you can decline them)

this is interesting. In this case, is the effect on the league I was in or all leagues in England?

Also interesting is the fact that this season, I've not even brought in one player on loan and we're not doing much worse because of it...

FM

[FrogMan]

October 13, 2012
We beat 11th place Luton 2-1 on their pitch. Huge, HUGE win, for me more than for anybody else. Jake Buxton and Lewis Grabban scored our goals.


October 20, 2012
We beat 9th place Darlington 3-2 on their pitch. Another big win on the road in which we went down 1-2 before bouncing back up. All goals were scored in the first half. Vine scored two, Sommner and Pearson had the other two.

We were sitting in 5th after that win.


October 27, 2012
We lose 0-3 against 21st place Rochdale (21) on their pitch. Odd one as the score is not representative of the game. A bad first goal and a lucky goal to start the second half gave them more wings than they should have had.


October 30, 2012
1-1 draw against Shrewsbury (2) at Mill Hill. Uninspired play in a game we should have lost. Very lucky to steal a point there.

November 3, 2012
5-0 win in a FA Cup 1st round match at Bath (Blue Square South). Strange one here. We lost possession with 45% and shots were about the same yet we dominated them and were lethal with our shots on target. Goals from Nix, Cox (2), Webster and Grimes.

The board are now delighted with the leadership abilities I'm demonstrating.

November 6, 2012
We beat Carlisle 3-2 on their pitch in the Johnstone's Paint Quarter Final. They're a League 1 side and while it looks very close, we were leading 3-0 until about 7 minutes left in the match. They scored in the 83rd minute and on a penalty in added time.

November 14, 2012
This one's for terpkristin. Arsène Wenger just got sacked by Arsenal following a run of poor results. :)

November 17, 2012
We beat 21st place Bradfordat 2-0 at home in a pretty evenly split game. Lewis Grabban scored our two goals.

November 20, 2012
We beat 14th place Wrexham 3-0 on their pitch. It was also a pretty evenly split game but we just had some more dangerous shots.

We were still in 5th place by that time.

November 24, 2012
We destroyed Corby 6-0 at Mill Hill in this 2nd round FA Cup match. They're a Blue Square North side and just like Bath in our first round match, they were just no match for us. 59% possession and 13 shots on target out of 15 compared to 1 out of 4 pretty much told the story in this one. Grabban had a hat trick in this one.

FM

[FrogMan]

November 27, 2012
We beat Darlington 2-0 in the Johnstone's Paint Semi Final on their pitch. We trailed a bit in possession in this one but killed them on set pieces, two corner kicks to be more specific. Both goals came from headers by centreback Wayne Thomas.

December 5, 2012
We lose 0-1 to 4th place Southend at Mill Hill. We could have jumped a couple spots in the standings as we were only a couple points behind Southend. We were ahead in most stats and in possession but they got the break.

Tougher than the loss in the game was the loss of Peter Gilbert for a couple months due to a groin strain suffered in training right before the game. Jake Buxton took his spot in the game.


December 8, 2012
We lose 1-3 at 21st place Oxford. Ugh, rough one to take. 1-1 at the half, we put more pressure and play better in the second half yet they score twice. One of those games. Buxton struggled in the DL spot.


December 12, 2012
We lose 2-3 againast 2nd place Crewe on the road. Ugh, three losses in a row and you can guarantee that your team morale takes a big hit. It was another hard fought, close game though and not one in which we got outclassed.


December 15, 2012
We beat 13th place Burton at Mill Hill. Just what the doctor ordered, a home gain with which we can rebound. We didn't really dominate but we converted when the time came.

December 26, 2012
We win 2-1 at 7th place Cheltenham. After 11 days off, the crazy Christmas stretch starts. We were down 0-1 until the 79th minute in this one but two goals within 4 minutes of one another put us ahead. Good thing we did too, would have been frustrating as hell to lose a game where you outshoot your opponent 13 to 3 (10 to 3 on target).

December 28, 2012
We win 2-1 against 23rd place Barnet at home. Byron Hart scored the winning goal in the 62nd minute.

December 31, 2012
Quite a few players with their contracts running in June this year:
Byron Webster
Wayne Thomas
Peter Gilbert
Ashley Vincent
Keigan Parker
Danny Schofield
Ivan Sproule
Anwar Uddin
Matt Somner
Gary Silk
Chris Smith
Louis Briscoe
Darryl Flahavan
Richard Lee

Five of these are starters: Webster, Thomas, Gilbert, Sproule, Lee. I don't think any of them can't be replaced to be honest. Maybe Webster is turning into a nicer DC, and Thomas gives us stability at the back, but all the other could leave and I'd be able to replace them. Sproule is having a very good season on the right wing, but he's up to 31yo and I might be tempted to go a bit younger.


January 1, 2013
We draw 1-1 at 18th place Aldershot. Scores and stats very even in the one. A fair result.

The transfer window opens but I think this is the first one where I'm comfortable enough with our squad that I won't even attempt any move. That is unless some of our better players get lured away and I have some money to play with...

January 5, 2013
We lose 1-2 to Preston at Mill Hill in this 3rd round FA Cup match. Kinda mad at the result to be honest. We held our own, statistically at least, especially in the second half. It just was not enough I guess. Guys were tired and it showed against a stronger Preston side.

January 9, 2013
We draw 2-2 against 10th place Leyton Orient at Mill Hill. We had a goal disallowed because of an offside in the 8th minute. We were already up 1-0 at that point and I'm sure it would have been the end of them at that point. Instead, Richard Lee let in a bad goal to close the half and we had to score in the 89th minute simply to tie the game.

We're in 8th place at this point, tied in points with 7th place Hereford.

January 12, 2013
We beat 4th place Bury 4-3 on their pitch. HUGE win that we didn't really deserve. Down 2-3 with less than 20 to play, we scored two in 11 minutes to get the lead with 7 to play. Their keeper rated at 3.

January 15, 2013
We're down 1-3 after the first leg of the Johnstone's Paint Final against Oldham. That first leg was played on their pitch and we got dominated. At one point midway through the second half, we had something like 37% possession for the game. We did much better to end it but still will have to do something miraculous to cover that two goal deficit. At least the second leg will be at home.

January 19, 2013
We lose 0-1 at 20th place Yeovil in a game we never challenged for. Disappointing loss, although it was on the road. We're in 7th place following that loss...

FM

[Marc Vaughan]

this is interesting. In this case, is the effect on the league I was in or all leagues in England?

Also interesting is the fact that this season, I've not even brought in one player on loan and we're not doing much worse because of it...

FM

It affects all the leagues in England.

[Marc Vaughan]

PS - Cracking performance so far in your second season - considering its your first season up you're looking solid :D

[FrogMan]

Forgot to mention in my reporting of the Yeovil loss that we suffered a more important loss in that game. Star left winger and spark plug of our attack, Dean Cox, twisted his knee in the game and will miss about three weeks. I'll be trying out Byron Hart and Danny Schofield on that left winger spot.

January 23, 2013
We play 24th place Macclesfield at Mill Hill and despite our difference in our respective positions in the standings, it's a very close game. We succeed in winning it, although only 1-0. Our possession was the key.

January 24, 2013
Hrm, one week from the transfer deadline and my scout comes raving about a left fullback that he claims is twice the player our best left back Peter Gilbert is. Name is Marcus Williams and he's 26yo and without a contract. Even better, he's not looking for the moon in terms of wages, only $1350 a week. I offer him $1050 for a two year contract and he agrees. Welcome to Mill Hill, Marcus!

Once he gets to the club, my assistant's enthusiasm is a bit more subdued. He says he's a four star rated player (current and potential ability) and that he's "a lot better" than Peter Gilbert. My scout had rated him as a 6 star kind of player.

Still, whenever I can replace a starter by a player who's qualified as "a lot better", it's good in my book.

FM

[FrogMan]

January 26, 2013
We play 19th place Chesterfield at Mill Hill. It's a good thing we took an early lead with a Matt Somner goal on a set piece in the 11th minute because Wayne Thomas is sent off for a professional foul just before the end of the half. They score two quick goals at the start of the second half but we're able to tie the game shortly after on a Ivan Sproule goal. Final Score: 2-2.

Very glad we hung on for the draw here. On paper, we're in 9th place but we're technically in a three way tie for 7th place and a playoff spot.

Wayne Thomas has been banned for a match and the banning holds despite my appeal.

To make room for the wage of newly signed Marcus Williams, I release Chris Smith on free. His contract was to end in June and it costs us $19k to let him go.

FM

[FrogMan]

It affects all the leagues in England.

cool, thanks for the info.

PS - Cracking performance so far in your second season - considering its your first season up you're looking solid :D

Thanks, very happy and almost surprised about it myself. As ecstatic as I can be about us challenging for a playoff spot, I'm not too sure I'd want us to promote after only one season. Might want to dominate in a second season and then move on up...

FM

[FrogMan]

January 29, 2013
We play 13th place Gillingham on their pitch. Schedule's been kinda hard on us lately, and will keep on being that way for a while too. Take a look at this:
Jan 15 at Oldham (Johnstone's Paint)
Jan 19 at Yeovil
Jan 23 vs Macclesfield
Jan 26 vs Chesterfield
Jan 29 at Gillingham
Feb 2 vs Torquay
Feb 5 vs Oldham (Johnstone's Paint)
Feb 9 at Stockport
Feb 13 vs Morecambe
Feb 16 vs Hereford

Let's see, that's 10 games over 32 days or a game every three and a half days. I don't remember seeing such a long stretch of matches at 3-4 days rest. A bit insane if you ask me and it's starting to take its toll on our players. Going into this game, quite a few are already at 90% condition or worse. Matt Somner's condition is at 88% and he'll sit out this one. Anwar Uddin takes his spot. Peter Gilbert is back at left back for one game.

The game is tough for us. We're down 0-2 at the half and it could have been 0-3 if not for one disallowed goal because of an offside. And then we exploded. Or I should say that Rowan Vine exploded. He started the game on the bench and was put in the game in the 60th minute. In the last 17 minutes he scored not one, not two but three goals turning this game on its head. Final Score: 3-2.

A hat trick in 17 minutes! Wow! Of course, he got the MoM, and their keeper got rated at 4 for his forms although I'm not entirely sure he was the only one to be blamed. They played awfully conservatively in that second half, not challenging our back line much if at all...

February 2, 2013
We play 19th place Torquay at Mill Hill. We completely shut them down in the first half, going up by one of an early Stephen Pearson goal. Rowan Vine adds to our lead scoring on a penalty kick to start the second half. Final Score: 2-0.

A dominant performance in which Wayne Thomas got the MoM. We move up to 6th place with this win, tied with Luton in points but with a match on hand.

FM

[FrogMan]

February 5, 2013
Today is the second leg of the Johnstone's Paint final and we're playing it in front of our fans. We're down 1-3 after the first leg and these fans lift us up like nothing else. Lewis Grabban scores in the 28th minute and I'm almost certain he's brought us back on level terms in the 35th minute but his goal is disallowed. He was offsides. We keep attacking like crazy but they are just this tiny bit better than us that they can contain our attacks. We lose it 2-3 on agregate scores.

Tough luck but at least we didn't get outclassed. This means we keep our team morale pretty high and given the rough stretch of schedule we're going through right now, this is a great thing.

I played Stephen Pearson on the left wing for this game and he got the MoM.

February 9, 2013
We play 10th place Stockport on their pitch. Ivan Sproule gives us a 1-0 lead in the 33rd minute and we keep that lead until the 76th minute when they pull even. It ends on that score.

Dean Cox was back from his injury and he's not lost a beat. He gets the MoM with a form rating of 9.

I'm quite okay with a draw on the road. We drop to 7th place but still only 2 points from 4th place Luton with a game on hand.

FM

[FrogMan]

February 13, 2013
We play 14th place Morecambe at Mill Hill. This is an ugly one. We go down 0-2 after only 21 minutes. They'd also put 3 shots out of 3 on target. These shots will be their last OF THE GAME. Yet, we score only once and can't tie the game despite putting 10 of 15 shots on target. Final Score: 1-2.

Ugh, Richard Lee was injured in the 35th minute but even then, he had hurt us in more ways than one. Darryl Flahavan had a good game for the last 55 minutes and will need to do so for about ten days since that's how long Lee will miss after hurting his heel.

We don't have a backup keeper, I guess this guy with the gray colored name will have to do as a fill-in for the time being...


February 16, 2013
We play 8th place Hereford at Mill Hill to finish this month long marathon of games. We have agood first half, going up by one in the 11th minute on an Ashley Grimes goal but they tie it in the injury time of the first half. We come back out strong and regain the lead on a Lewis Grabban goal in the 54th minute. We close up shop after that goal and hold on for a 2-1 win. Feels good to win at home.

We move up to 6th place with the win, still only 2 points away from Luton and the fourth place.

FM

[FrogMan]

February 23, 2013
We play 1st place Southend on their pitch. They're not in first place without a reason. We're outclassed in this game. Down 0-2 after 17 minutes, then 0-3 at the start of the second half, we claim one back on a Rowan Vine goal in the 64th minute but they hit us right back. Ashley Grimes will score in the 80th minute but it was in a losing effort. Final Score: 2-4.

We drop to 8th place with the loss.

Flahavan gets rated at 5 and our keepers make me nervous. Richard Lee was not super impressive before getting injured and Flahavan just proved he's really just a backup. I see this 28yo keeper available for free, Lewis Price. My scout seems to think he'd be a lot better than Richard Lee and he would be available for fairly cheap as he's only asking for $650 a week. I offer him that and he accepts. Skill wise, he is not super impressive but both my scout and assistant seem to think he's an improvement over Lee who's now seen as a useful backup to Price.

FM

[FrogMan]

March 1, 2013
The board are still delighted with the leadership qualities I'm demonstrating.

March 2, 2013
We play 4th place Luton at Mill Hill. Wow, they sure moved up since I last checked, but they are still only 3 points away from us with 12 matches to play. We start the game wow, the guys seem to feed off my emotions for this game. We're ahead 1-0 after 22 minutes, thanks to a Matt Somner goal off a 20 yard long free kick. Better than that, in those 22 minutes, we've maintained possession 68% of the time and have place 5 shots on target out of 6 while limiting them to only one shot on target, their only shot. Our pressure is so great that one of their centreback is forced to commit a professional foul in the 43rd minute and is sent off. The second half is us taking control of the game completely. We do not add to our lead but we keep on shutting them off any good scoring chances. Final Score: 1-0.

Score doesn't look like much but this is a huge win, at least for me personally. We move back up to 7th place but Luton drop a couple spots to 6th and we're now tied in points.

FM

[FrogMan]

March 5, 2013
Important match today as we play 8th place Darlington on their pitch. We own a one point advantage over them so with 11 matches to play in the season, this is as close to must win as they come. We come out strong but they are winning possession for most of the first half. Rowan Vine scores on what must have been a frustrating goal for them as it happened a good 4 minutes into injury time for the first half. Vine then doubles his tally another 4 minutes into the second half and even though they do score in the 75th minute, it was too little too late for them. Final Score: 2-1.

Awesome win on the road! Vine gets the MoM with his two goals and we move up to 6th place, actually in a three way tie on points with Luton and Shrewsbury.

FM

[FrogMan]

March 9, 2013
We play 15th place Rochdale at Mill Hill. Wow, what a unlucky start. Not that we're real aggressive but they came out and shot twice in the first half and they lead 2-1 at the break, Lewis Grabban scoring our lone goal. He adds another one with only 5 minutes to go as we scratch our way back for one tiny point. They only had one more shot for the whole second half.

Dean Cox left the game in the 55th minute and will miss about 3 weeks with a broken toe. Back to a mix of Schofield, Hart and Pearson at the left wing spot.

March 16, 2013
We play 6th place Shrewsbury on their pitch. Another important match as we're currently just one tiny point ahead of them in the standings. It's a typical away game for us in that we're having a rough time controlling the ball yet we're not being completely dominated. We go down one in the 52nd minute and I'm kind desperate for us to score so I switch us ot a 4-2-4 formation with about 12 minutes to go. It pays off in the 85th minute when Lewis Grabban scores the equalizer. My heart stops when 2 minutes into added time they score. It starts beating again when I spot the assistant referee's raised flag. There was an offside, the goal doesn't count! Final Score: 1-1.

Phew, dodged a bullet there and maintained our position in the standings.

FM

[FrogMan]

March 23, 2013
It's another important and tough match today as we play 2nd place Crewe at Mill Hill. Sometimes it's better to be lucky than good and we're just that in the first half. Despite being outclassed in possession and shots, we come out at the break leading 1-0 on a Ivan Sproule goal during added time. We play much better in the second half and even lead most of it. Final Score: 1-0.

What a comfortingly nice win. Sproule gets a deserved MoM.

Luton only drew their game and we move within 2 points of them with seven games to play.

FM

[Marc Vaughan]

Wow - looks like you've a good chance of making the play-offs and a slim chance still of grabbing an automatic promotion if you get lucky ... kudos :D

(and keep grinding out draws where required - I find a lot of FMH players either give up on a match or go totally gung-ho when behind, yet its often the points from draws which can make all the difference at the end of the season ...)

[FrogMan]

Wow - looks like you've a good chance of making the play-offs and a slim chance still of grabbing an automatic promotion if you get lucky ... kudos :D

Thanks Marc, very happy with how the season's gone so far. I pretty much expected us to sizzle and spiral in some sort of long losing streak at some point but I'm really happy that it has not been the case. I've worked hard on maintaining morale through player interaction and I gues it might have paid off in the long run.


(and keep grinding out draws where required - I find a lot of FMH players either give up on a match or go totally gung-ho when behind, yet its often the points from draws which can make all the difference at the end of the season ...)

Yeah, I rarely go gung-ho, unless we're behind by one or tied at home and I have a feeling it was an unlucky goal by them. You know, the kind of game where you are at home, have like 10 shots on target to their 2 or 3 and yet it's 1-1 or you're down 0-1. Otherwise, and especially if I'm on the road, I'm often happy with a draw...

FM

[FrogMan]

March 30, 2013
We play 23rd place Bradford on their pitch. It's a tale of two halves in this one. The first half was pretty close. Even though we were losing possession by a tiny bit (46-54), we were pushing it to their backline and it was 1-1 after 45. The second was ugly football on our part though. Not one shot tried in the whole 45 minutes and after we went down 1-2 on a penalty about 2 minutes into the half, it was very frustrating for me to see the guys just give up like that. Final score: 1-2.

Yeah, we will lose some but I've come to expect better from the guys, especially against the 23rd team in the standings, even if it's away from home.

We drop to 8th place with the loss but are third in a three way tie for 6th place with Shrewsbury and Cheltenham. Our goal differential is not as good as these two so we'll have to outright pass them to be in the playoff I'm afraid...

FM

[FrogMan]

March 31, 2013
I get the three months reminder for players with contracts expiring in June. I'm not really in a urge to extend contract as most of them seem like backup or players we could upgrade on. The two important ones ar centrebacks Byron Webster and Wayne Thomas. They both want more than what my board will allow given how much above the wage budget we are at the moment. I offer them what the board allow which turns out to be just about the same wage they are earning this season. They both accept! It's a 1 season deal for the 33yo Thomas and a 3 season deal for the 26yo Webster, the better of the two. I'm happy with that.

April 3, 2013
Dean Cox has resumed full training following his foot injury.

April 6, 2013
We play 15th place Wrexham at Mill Hill. They're currently on a very hot streak, ranking first for form in their six last match. Matt Somner has a tendency to pick up yellow cards and he'll have to sit this one out after picking too many of them. Robert Milson starts in his place. After going down one in the 3rd minute, we pick ourselves up and go boom-boom in the 14th and 15th minute, scoring two goals within a minute of one another. Lewis Grabban scored the first and Byron Webster showed me why I wanted to sign him when he heads a corner kick in right after. Grabban adds another goal in injury time of the first half and we're on our way to a 3-2 win. Their second goal came on a penalty kick in the 83rd minute. This kinda worries me as we've been called for penalties in each of our last two games.

Still, it's a great win against a team in great form. We move back up a couple spots as Shrewsbury drew their game and Darlington lost theirs. With only five games to play, it's going to be a dogfight between the teams currently between 3rd and 8th place...

Meanwhile, Southend have achieved a playoff spot in League 2.

FM

[Marc Vaughan]

I both love and hate seasons like the one you're having - tons of excitement, hope your team can keep their nerve.

PS - One thing to bear in mind with contract renewals, sometimes players will play better near the end of their contract (to try and get them renewed) and sometimes players will slack off after obtaining a new one ... depends entirely on their personalities but bear it in mind.

[FrogMan]

I both love and hate seasons like the one you're having - tons of excitement, hope your team can keep their nerve.

Yeah, got the feeling it'll be a nailbiter until the very end, and I've not played one more match than what's in here so I'm no saying this only to keep you reading. :)


PS - One thing to bear in mind with contract renewals, sometimes players will play better near the end of their contract (to try and get them renewed) and sometimes players will slack off after obtaining a new one ... depends entirely on their personalities but bear it in mind.

Yeah, had read that somewhere. I tend to be super nervous and always feared losing players on Bossmans but I've realized that my players are not really that good so I'm waiting a bit more with the contracts. The more I get comfortable with the team, the more I'm learning that I'll probably be able to replace most of these guys. Don't want to start a season with 11 new players obviously, but you know what I mean...

FM

[FrogMan]

April 13, 2013
We play 12th place Leyton Orient on their pitch. What a freakishly ugly game for us. I start us out offensive and while the stats are pretty even and we're only down 0-1 at the half, we got three players having horrendous games. Marcus Williams, Matt Somner and Kyle Nix are all rated at 5 after 45 minutes while 6 players on the other side are rated at 8. This continues in the second half and we're completely dominated. They add a goal on yet another late game penalty. Final Score 0-2.

Blech. We drop to 7th place with this loss. Luckily for us, Darlington only drew their game and are still one point behind us.

FM

[FrogMan]

April 20, 2013
We play 17th place Oxford at Mill Hill. Ugh, even at home, and against a 17th place team, we're sligth underdogs to win this match. We're ahead 1-0 after 45 but it's not because we really challenged their keeper. One shot on target out of two and it continues that way in the second. We eventually let one get in and it ends in a 1-1 draw.

We're having a rough go right now, players not playing as well as they used to earlier in the season. Darlington drew again so we retain the 7th spot. Shrewsbury even lost their match so we're tied with them in points now with only 3 matches to play.

Meanwhile, Southend have clinched promotion from League 2, Crewe have clinched a playoff spot and Macclesfield have been relegated from League 2.

FM

[FrogMan]

April 23, 2013
We play 13th place Burton on their pitch. Kyle Nix gives us the lead in the 28th minute but we let them tie only 7 minutes later. They are spraing our keeper with shots, 8 on target out of 10 in the first half and another 6 on target out of 11 in the second half. They score in the 50th minute but Lewis Grabban grabs us a so important point with his goal in the 83rd minute. Final Score: 2-2.

Shrewsbury also drew but Darlington won and they move ahead of both teams. We're now on the outside looking in, in 8th place with only 2 games to play. We could win our last two games and still not make the playoffs...

Southend have won the League 2 title. Bury have clinched a playoff spot.

FM

[FrogMan]

April 27, 2013
We play 5th place Cheltenham at Mill Hill. Ugh, rough one there as Cheltenham are red hot right now with the 2nd best form over the last 6 matches in the league. We're having a good start in this one and are ahead 1-0 on a Ivan Sproule goal in the 31st minute. I'm thinking that we can win this one as we're playing really well, then it all falls apart. First they tie the game in the 43rd minute then Lee Beevers gets sent off. Trying to win this one will be much tougher with only ten men on the pitch. Still, we keep working hard and even take the lead again when Lewis Grabban scores in the 69th minute. We try to keep them away from our goal and we succeed for some time but they finally tie the game in the 85th minute. Final Score: 2-2.

AAAAARRRRGGGGG!!! Shrewsbury won but Darlington lost. Had we won, we would have moved past them and into safety. We're still sitting just outside the playoffs zone with one match to play. This is driving me insane!

FM

[FrogMan]

May 4, 2013
We play 23rd place Barnet on their pitch for our last match of the regular season. Darlington are playing at 18th place Rochdale while Shrewsbury will be playing at home against 4th place Luton. Wow, what a boring game that is. 0-0 at the half, one shot on target out of two for us and their only shot landed off target. We're winning possession though, might try pushing a bit harder. A quick look at the live table reveals that Darlington is losing their match and if it stayed that way, a draw would put us into the playoffs. Gotta keep that in mind...

We're having a rougher second half and they start attacking more. After 82 minute, we're still tied 0-0 and Darlington is still losing their match. Our match ends in a scoreless draw and I'm hoping beyond hope that this fourth draw in a row will be enough for us to keep on playing in the playoffs. I flick the screen and my heart sinks. We're showing in 8th place... Darlington scored in the 85th minute of their match to draw it 3-3. Shrewsbury also drew 0-0 with Luton. We've been kept out of the playoffs on goal differential. :(

So close yet so far away. We finish this first season in League 2 in 8th place. Still not bad, yet soooooooo frustrating.

Barnet is the other team relegated from League 2.

FM

[Marc Vaughan]

Ohhhhh that is sooo cruel, the end of a season can be a hard ask if you don't have a lot of depth ... especially in the lower leagues, those extra 8 matches a season in the league take a bit out of players, especially those who have limited stamina (or are at the tail end of their career and a little older).

Best of luck for next season - was a great season to read from the outside, shame you didn't make it .... but then again if you always did it wouldn't make it so satisfying ...

[terpkristin]

I can almost taste your frustration as you went through these last few games. Still, 8th place isn't bad for your first season up.

/tk

[FrogMan]

Ohhhhh that is sooo cruel, the end of a season can be a hard ask if you don't have a lot of depth ... especially in the lower leagues, those extra 8 matches a season in the league take a bit out of players, especially those who have limited stamina (or are at the tail end of their career and a little older).

Best of luck for next season - was a great season to read from the outside, shame you didn't make it .... but then again if you always did it wouldn't make it so satisfying ...

So cruel indeed. You start the season with tiny expectations, only hoping to survive and not be relegated, then you start winning. Even sit close to the top for a while, then you keep on playing well, although a bit more on the level of what you should be expecting from your newly promoted team. Then, while you don't really spiral down a long losing streak, you just can't buy a win and you miss out by this much. Tied on points, out because of the tiebreaker. Again, AAAAAAAARRRRRRGGGGGG!!!

Glad you enjoyed the read and I agree, it wouldn't be normal if you alway won so I can live with it. Was reading a thread on SI I think about people complaining the game was too easy. Well, it is not, at least not really for now. :)


I can almost taste your frustration as you went through these last few games. Still, 8th place isn't bad for your first season up.

/tk

I bet you can taste it for sure, it was really tough. I played out the last 2-3 matches on Saturday afternoon, comfortably seated with some Explosions in the Sky playing through my Bluetooth headset and only the fact I love my Touch so much kept me from hurling it away in disgust. That and I didn't want to set a bad example and have my wife take it away from me... :)

Of course, 8th place is beyond anything I was hoping for and I'm still very happy with it.

Will take a break from reporting and will simply enjoy playing the game. Might come back later. Take care everyone!

FM

[FrogMan]

oh, Marc, kudos on making such a great port of a great game into a great portable version I can take anywhere I go. Is it perfect? No, but what game is. I've now played three seasons and it's about two more than I've played in each of the last two versions of the PC game where for a reason or another, I had a hard time staying seated in front of my PC to go through to the second season.

FM

[Marc Vaughan]

oh, Marc, kudos on making such a great port of a great game into a great portable version I can take anywhere I go. Is it perfect? No, but what game is. I've now played three seasons and it's about two more than I've played in each of the last two versions of the PC game where for a reason or another, I had a hard time staying seated in front of my PC to go through to the second season

Glad you're enjoying it - the iPhone game has been a labour of love for me really, it started as a 'pet project' at home to prove that it could be done and has evolved from there.

Its had a very compact development team (ie. me, although Rich is increasingly keeping me company now :D) which unfortunately means the 2d isn't quite as glitch free as I'd like (but I'm working on this side of things and its 'getting there' slowly but surely) - but in general I'm proud of how it 'plays' and most importantly I really enjoy it myself ;)

I'm really enjoying the fact that you can release updates to games on the iPhone regularly and a new update with some additional features and a choice of database (start of season or january transfer window) should be out later this month .. with more planned in the coming months :D

[FrogMan]

So, the 2013-14 season is well under way and after losing our first game of the season, we've absolutely taken League 2 by storm. We're sitting in first place with a 9 points lead and a match on hand. Not bad, heh. :)

Now comes the funny part. Take a look at the news item below...

[FrogMan]

So, you stopped laughing yet? :)

Even funnier is that as good as it's going with Mansfield now, I'm tempted to apply for that job. Luton is where my heart is and I'd really like to have a second go with them. I'm much more confident I'd be able to get something going now. It'd mean a lot of work getting the team to my taste whereas Mansfield are playing just the way I like them but I feel like Mansfield will always be a much smaller team than Luton. Remember that Luton was once in the Championship...

What do you think? Should I try it?

FM

[thehitcat]

Go for it Froggy!!

Also we'd want to follow that :)

[terpkristin]

I'd totally let Luton sweat. You're kicking tuckus where you are, let them see what they gave up on.

/tk

[Marc Vaughan]

Even funnier is that as good as it's going with Mansfield now, I'm tempted to apply for that job. Luton is where my heart is and I'd really like to have a second go with them. I'm much more confident I'd be able to get something going now. It'd mean a lot of work getting the team to my taste whereas Mansfield are playing just the way I like them but I feel like Mansfield will always be a much smaller team than Luton. Remember that Luton was once in the Championship...
What do you think? Should I try it?

Its always tempting to take a job when its offered and its a big compliment that you were offered it .... but bear in mind that you've got a side you know and trust around you, leaving that to join a new one is a big risk .... your call entirely (now if it was Brighton I'd be saying take it ;) ).

[FrogMan]

Go for it Froggy!!

Also we'd want to follow that :)

I'd totally let Luton sweat. You're kicking tuckus where you are, let them see what they gave up on.

/tk

Its always tempting to take a job when its offered and its a big compliment that you were offered it .... but bear in mind that you've got a side you know and trust around you, leaving that to join a new one is a big risk .... your call entirely (now if it was Brighton I'd be saying take it ;) ).

you guys have all summarized my thinking... I'm tempted to take the opportunity to have another shot with Luton, given that I might have screwed part of my first shot when I was learning the ropes with the new game.

On the other hand, the fact they have sacked another manager because they are in 12th place in League 2 means they keep the leash short and for now the Mansfield board are absolutely delighted with my management of the club. We're playing really well, in good position to challenge for the title when I promised the board we'd simply make the playoffs.

And yeah, the players I have here are players I brought on board.

Marc, I've not officially received an offer, it's only the pundits who think I should be the one going over there. I've not played the game in the last couple days so what you saw posted there is the last thing I've heard...

FM

[FrogMan]

Ok, just played for the first time in a week and a couple games after that news item, Luton formally came out and offered me the job. I decided to stay at Mansfield, with the bunch of players I've brought on. I sorta expected a tiny new item about my board saying they were happy about my loyalty or something like that but nithing showed. I go check my board's confidence level and woah, they are aparently now VERY happy with my control of wages. Err, what? I have been running about 3k over budget since the start of the season. I'm kinda confused until I see tgat my wage budget has been increased from about 32k to about 52k a week! Yowza! Maybe there'll be some news item after our next game. It's December 28 now and we're entering the crazy Holiday stretch.

FM

[Marc Vaughan]

I can't remember if there is a 'thank you' message after you decline a job - I'll have to check, if there isn't .... there will be at some point in the future (good call :D).