FIFA15 (Yes, FIFA) Exeter City Manager Career

[Radii]

Not sure if this will go anywhere, but I have the itch to play out some games, and I'm still a little bit afraid of NBA2k15 on PC so I'm going to wait for a bit for it. I took advantage of a 25% off coupon to buy FIFA 15 on Green Man Gaming and am beginning a manager career with it. We'll see how this works as a dynasty.

I've set up the following sliders: DRUNKEN FERRET'S FIFA 15 ASSISTED/SEMI SLIDERS - Operation Sports Forums

Game: FIFA 15 Next Gen (Camera: Tele Broadcast)
Controls: Semi/Assisted/airball switch
Difficulty: World Class
Halves: 10 or 15 Minutes
Speed: Slow

Game Sliders
Human/CPU

Sprint: 45/45
Acceleration: 50/50
Shot Error: 51/52
Pass Error: 50/60...back and forth on this and 58, but was getting too many 90+ at 58 for cpu
Shot Speed: 49/49
Pass Speed: 52/52
Injury Frequency: 55/65...my experience has been I've been gutted by injuries throughout season
Injury Severity: 40/40
GK Ability: 51/51
Marking: 55/50
Run Frequency: 50/40...cpu is lower to ensure they play better defense, higher and they get caught.
Line Height: 50/50
Line Length: 54/54
Line Width: 48/48
Fullbacks: 55/55
Power Bar(user only): 50
First Touch Control: 52/52

I was able to survive in FIFA 14 on the World Class difficulty after a little while, so I'm hoping for the same here. These sliders are designed for realism. The "Slow" speed supposedly encourages a little more buildup and midfield play which sounds appealing to me.

I have the halves set at 10 minutes. In the couple exhibition games I've played that generated between 7-13 shots for each team with 1-0 and 2-1 scores. I've gone through the skills tutorials and gotten gold in everything (but completed the difficult "skill challenges" in none of the categories) to shake off a little rust. I am playing on PC using a PS3 controller.

I expect to struggle early on as I warm up to the difficulty, I've never been a superstar at the FIFA games though so I don't expect to get to a point where my stick skills are just too good and the management doesn't matter, at least not anytime soon.

This doesn't go as deep into low level management as FM does of course, but there are four leagues in England, which offers a lot of room for growth.

I decide to start with what looks like the worst team in England's Football League 2, Exeter City

[Radii]

Exeter City Overview

Attacking: 54
Midfield: 58
Defense: 57

Transfer Budget: $400,000
Weekly Wages: $21,250


This is all I have to go on at the team selection screen. It looks like Exeter runs a 5-3-2.

Most wage budgets in League 2 are between $20,000-$35,000. A couple are lower than Exeter, but not significantly. Notable exceptions are Oxford at $47,250, Southend at $40,000, and Portsmouth at $143,750/wk... WTF? So I guess Portsmouth should promote up or else.

Transfer Budgets are between $200,000 and $850,000. We're in the middle of the pack here.

I set the "Financial Strictness" to Moderate. It looks like 75% of our revenue from player sales will be put into the transfer budget.

There aren't a ton of stadiums available. We're playing in something called "Town Park" which seats 12,000. Not where Exeter actually plays.


We'll look at individual players momentarily, first I have a look around at everything else.

Scouting

We have two scouts with 3* Judgement. This actually seems pretty good, hiring a 3* scout would cost $1.6 million. Hiring a 1* scout is $66,000. I have one of my scouts scouting England, and another I will be sending to Scotland.

Messages

Lets see what the board has to say starting things up.

-- Our goal is to make the round of 32 in the "Domestic Cup" ... Is that any of them? This game appears to have the FA Cup, Capital One Cup, and Johnstone's Paint Trophy for Exeter to participate in.

-- I'm reminded that the transfer window is open. Indeed, we do start on July 1st.

-- My assistant manager tells me we should be looking for a striker.

-- We are expected to finish mid-table in league play. Given that we look like the worst or second worst team in the league, that actually might be a challenge.


Roster Overview

A quick positional overview. I'll go more in depth as needed later. Starters underlined.


GK: Christy Pym - 19 y/o - 55 OVR
GK: James Hamon - 19 y/o - 47 OVR

RB: Christian Ribeiro - 24 y/o - 61 OVR
RB: Danny Butterfield - 34 y/o - 58 OVR
RB: Aaron Dawson - 22 y/o - 51 OVR

CB: Scot Bennett - 23 y/o - 60 OVR
CB: Pat Baldwin - 31 y/o - 59 OVR
CB: Jordan Moore-Taylor - 20 y/o - 56 OVR
CB: Jordan Tillson - 21 y/o - 49 OVR

LB: Craig Woodman - 31 y/o - 60 OVR
LB: Connor Riley-Lowe - 16 y/o - 46 OVR

CDM: David Noble - 32 y/o - 60 OVR
CM: Liam Sercombe - 24 y/o - 61 OVR
CM: Matt Oakley - 36 y/o - 59 OVR
RM: David Wheeler - 23 y/o - 57 OVR
CM: Alex Byrne - 18 y/o - 48 OVR
CM: Jason Pope - 18 y/o - 47 OVR
CM: Matthew Grimes - 18 y/o - 54 OVR
CM: Paul Tisdale - 41 y/o - 40 OVR
LM: Arron Davies - 30 y/o - 59 OVR
CAM: Jimmy Keohane - 23 y/o - 56 OVR


ST: Graham Cummins - 26 y/o - 57 OVR
ST: Tom Nichols - 20 y/o - 55 OVR
ST: Matthew Jay - 18 y/o - 48 OVR
ST: Ollie Watkins - 18 y/o - 49 OVR
ST: Jamie Reid - 19 y/o - 52 OVR


Striker Graham Cummins makes $2,000/wk. Everyone else on our team, literally every single person, makes $750/wk. Contracts range from 1 year to 5. Cummins is in the last year of his contract, which is probably good given that he doesn't seem like someone that should make more than 3 times what anyone else on the team makes.

The two oldest players on the team, 36 y/o Matt Oakley and 41 y/o Paul Tisdale are both retiring at the end of the year. That's an issue for Oakley who at 59 OVR is one of the higher rated players on the team.

Starting midfielder David Noble is on loan with us for the entire season. Everyone else is on a regular contract.


Roster Thoughts:

We run a 5-3-2 so we run three Center Backs. But we only have 4 on the roster. That should be an immediate emphasis.

We don't have depth in the midfield but our starters are actually ok. Its a concern that one guy is on loan and another retiring, but as far as immediately issues, midfield seems ok.

Holy crap our strikers are awful.

Next up we'll look through our players a bit closer to see if any of them have any traits that make them stand out past their crappy overall ratings.

[Radii]

Our best player is 24 y/o CM Liam Sercombe:





Next up is 26 y/o ST Graham Cummins




Not very much to look at. He's our top target in the air on crosses though, and knowing how I play this game, that's probably important.



Out other striker, 20 y/o ST Tom Nichols




Nichols is crap in the air, but faster and a better finisher than Cummins, so maybe they complement each other well.

[Radii]

Also worth a note is RB Christian Riberio, our fastest defender, our defense looks ok overall (certainly better than our strikers), but Riberio is definitely a candidate to get involved a little more with the offense at times. With speed and stamina above 70, and a crossing rating of 62, solid for this level, he could be noteworthy.


-- My scout in England came prepared with a few names to look at, and I pick 4 targets to scout. They're young EPL players though, I'd be surprised if any were just available to us.


-- I start going through the scouting process, trying to decide what, if anything, I want to do during the July transfer window. It seems like I have 3 options:

1) do nothing, and see how my team is, and try to make moves accordingly for January.

2) I can try to loan in one or two big players for the year. It looks like there's no option to have the parent team pay the salary, so I have to be able to afford the player's wage. This limits me, as I do find a lot of youngsters who are making like $7,000/wk at Chelsea or whatever. Those guys are off limits.

3) I can try to buy a player or two to develop myself.


The loan option, option 2, seems like the best way to get better right now, but it puts all my eggs in one or two baskets (I can increase my wage budget by decreasing my transfer budget, but still, bringing in 2 good players on loan would likely be my limit). And it commits all my money to winning now with temporary loaners.


-- We get through most of July without anything noteworthy happening. I have a lead on a Man City CB that I could buy. Remember that I am concerned about my depth at center back, given that we run 3 of them at once.

-- We also have our eye on a Newcastle Striker to try to loan in. I first submitted an offer to loan w/ an option to buy, but they don't want to sell him (and my offer was low). I resubmit the offer as loan only.


July 27th, 2014

-- We play our first friendly, vs Kortrijk, a Belgian squad.

GK: Pym
D: Woodman/Baldwin/Bennett/Moore-Taylor/Ribeiro
M: Noble/Wheeler
AM: Oakley
ST: Nichols/Cummins

Our top player, Sercombe in the midfield, is hurt (he was coming into this). He'll be ready to go early into the season.

1st Half: We give up one chance early but they head one wide. Mistake on my part overrunning the play trying to make a tackle. One of their midfielders picks up two yellows in the first 25 minutes, so a red and a big advantage for me. We end up at the half in a scoreless tie. We have 4 shots to their 3, 52% of the possession, and we've got the only on target shot. But really they had two headers that were a bit scary and we've had nothing. A lot of that is me being rusty and not knowing this team yet.

2nd half:

Still trying to see what kind of reporting is worthwhile here. Lets try something like what I do in FM.

50': Their first shot on target, a free kick from 25 yards out over the wall. Pym dives for it and stops it and holds it.

53': We move forward down the middle, LB Woodman passes ahead to Cummins, he holds the ball up about 25 yards out. He puts on a burst of speed towards the center, getting enough space for a shot, fired from 20 yards, its by a defender sliding in to block it, and into the upper right corner for a goal! Solid individual effort to score that. 1-0

63': Kortrijk get a lob into the right corner to set up a cross, we head the cross away but they recover, a strong shot comes in from just inside the area, deflected and wide, corner kick. Corner goes to the far side of the 6 yard box, they win the header but contested pretty well, and over.

68': MC Keohane is in, Wheeler out.

74': Nichols up ahead to Cummins who is able to just run by his man and into the area, easily a clear cut chance, but a weak left footed effort goes wide.

74': CM Davies in for Oakley.

79': Last sub, RB Butterfield in for Ribeiro. We drop back to a defensive mindset.

88': They are attacking desparately now, we clear out cross after cross but can't really control it well in the midfield to fully remove pressure. Here they finally get a cross in, a shot is blocked, and one of my center backs boots it behind for a corner. The corner is punched away by my GK.

That's it!

Exeter 1 : 0 KV Kortrijk

Man of the Match: Craig Woodman (7.6)
Goals: Cummins (6.8)
Assists: Woodman
Notables: Pym (7.3), Moore-Taylor (7.0)

Low-Mid 6.x ratings from my midfield, higher ratings from the defense. My RB, Ribeiro, is the faster guy and I have him set to make runs forward and to overlap the midfield, and its my left back that ends up making the assist.

I end up taking 6 shots, Cummins with 4 (1 on target). My other striker, Nichols, doesn't take any. In the first half I spent more of my time trying to make runs down the right and find crosses, that just didn't work at all. I had more success going up the middle and just trying to find a little space for my strikers once they got the ball.

We managed 6 shots, 2 on target. They shot 10 times, 3 on target. Possession 52/48 in their favor. Passing accuracy at 87% for us, 90% for them. 4 fouls for them, 1 for me.


I'm happy with all of that for a first match. Each team had a couple other serious threats that we couldn't convert, there was the potential for more goals here.


I made a highlight out of my first goal:

[Radii]

-- We are getting really close to the end of July. I'm waiting to hear back from Newcastle on my top target, a loan offer for a striker upgrade. While that's going on I also make loan offers to another striker, and a left back. I was not expecting to make an offer there but I think this guy would be worth it if we can get it.

-- There's one center back available, a guy I could get for $200,000 from Man City, but he's only rated 55 OVR. He's also only 17, so maybe that means he'd be a great project for me... but I don't quite know enough about player progression yet, and I think I really would rather get guys that can make an impact right now, or wait until January.

July 31st - Loan Acquisition

We bring in 17 y/o CF Adam Armstrong from Newcastle.



He'll cost us $2,250/wk. I've dropped my transfer budget to accomodate that plus the other offers we have outstanding.

Armstrong isn't necessarily a superstar or anything, but it looks really difficult to get a superstar. So instead we decide that a player who is a very clear upgrade at a critical position is good enough. Armstrong will start next to Cummins. This will relegate Tom Nichols to the bench.


July 31st - Friendly #2

Well this could be ugly. We travel to the states, to Washington DC specifically, to play DC United. I assume they're better than us.

We're going to come out with a defensive look.

GK: Pym
D: Woodman/Baldwin/Bennett/Moore-Taylor/Ribeiro
M: Noble/Wheeler
AM: Oakley
ST: Armstrong/Cummins

3': They get forward down the right immediately, a pass to the area and shot forces a diving save from Pym. They earn a corner, getting just a weak header, saved.

7': Great chance for Exeter, we hold it up, lots of passing in the middle before working down the left side, we get it to Cummings, he holds it and a space opens in the center, CM Wheeler cuts into it, Cummings with the feed, he's got a clear cut chance in the area, but puts it well wide.

26': Pym makes a save on a free kick. Nothing noteworthy in any individual play, but, he's got 6 saves now, he's busy.

43': Finally the inevitable. They pass it around the front of the goal and we just can't get the ball away, free shot from inside the area for Fabian Espindola, and he buries it. 0-1

45': Awful penalty on Woodman, basically I tried to anticipate a break toward the goal and tried a slide tackle. I'm lucky it wasn't a red. Espindola with the penalty. 0-2

HALF: They shoot 7 times to our 1. I was a bit worried when we got that early breakaway that these sliders were just too easy or something, but boy that isn't true at all!

At the half I sub in CB Tilson for Bennett, I'm just going to make sure I use the players less likely to see action in games that matter.

65': LB Riley-Lowe in for Woodman.

77': Our defense breaks down completely after we allow them to fully set up in our end. They get an easy goal... but its credited an own goal against my defender Tilson. At best the ball touched him as he tried to block it on the way in, but it really looks like he didn't touch it at all. 0-3

77': Backup GK Hamon in for Pym.

88': One last (hopefully) goal for DC United on a pretty damn nice give and go play. My only hope was for the offsides, but no, very nice break from the scorer, whose name I missed. 0-4

DC United 4 : 0 Exeter

My starting GK Pym actually gets an 8.5 rating on the day for stopping 11 shots, even though he allowed two in. CB Bennett 4.5, CB Baldwin 5.3, CB Moore-Taylor 5.7, CM Oakley 5.8. Low 6's elsewhere.

I actually played better in the second half, but they probably let up some too. They pressed very hard in the first half and I just couldn't move, I gave it away non stop in the midfield. In the second half I was more patient and it did lead to a bit more possession, and a couple chances advancing the ball, but nothing serious.



-- Silly me, I forgot that the transfer window in the summer in England runs until the end of August, I thought it was ending... not quite yet.

-- We have one more friendly before league play starts. We play twice a week throughout August.

[Radii]

Loan Acquisition

Welcome 20 y/o LB Bradley Garmston to Exeter! He'll be with us this year, making $3,000/wk. He's on loan from West Brom.

We had to drop our transfer budget in half to be able to afford the second loan. I was slightly torn on this, b/c our current LB Woodman seems solid'ish so far, but, this is an EA game in the end, and speed kills.




Woodman is a good deal more aggressive. Woodman is better at long passes too. But most of the other reasons that allow Woodman's OVR rating to be the same as Garmston's (both are 60) are irrelevant, penalty taking, volley's, finishing, etc. Garmston is just as good marking, tackling, crossing, dribbling, etc. Plus THAT SPEED. So we'll see if we can find a way to make use of that blistering speed in matches.



-- We did have to reduce our transfer budget to afford Garmston. That leaves me currently with a $220,500 transfer budget and essentially no wage budget.

Playing with the slider I have two options here. If I set my transfer budget to $0, I can afford $4,400/wk in salary, which would allow me one more impact loan player. I could also drop the transfer budget to $150,000 and be able to pay a player $1,500/wk. That would allow me to make a purchase of a cheaper player if I found something promising.

I am continuing to fully scout things out, I suspect I will go all in on trying to win this year though with another player on loan.


I don't have any additional loan offers out right now (I did have one to another striker, but it was just rejected). While I expect to try to bring in another loaner, I will likely wait until I've played a couple matches that count and get a bit further into August before making offers.

August 4th, 2014 - Friendly #3

We host Sarandi, a team that looks to be from Argentina. I think.

17': Yellow card on their midfielder Aleman for a sliding challenge.

19': CM Wheeler is hurt on that yellow that just happened, I didn't notice immediately. I bring in LM Davies for him.

23': A mixup in switching control gives them a clear cut chance as I pull the wrong defender out of position. They blast it wide somehow.

30': We build up slowly, first down the middle, then a pass out wide to Garmston. He holds the ball up about 35 yards out, turns by his man with a burst of speed, and sends a ball into the area for MC Oakley who was making a run. Oakley is behind the defense, strikes it left footed with his first touch, and its in!! 1-0

34': We give the goal back, a CB comes out too far to try to pressure them and leaves a big hole, they find ST Aleman who scores easily. 1-1

HALF: We allow one scary shot and get a couple crosses of our own but go into halftime tied at one.

Somehow we are credited with 0 shots taken, despite having a goal... We've allowed 7 shots, 3 on target, we've also allowed 57% of the possession. I knew it was bad, but I didn't realize that bad. We've passed very poorly, and I've made a lot of mistakes here, both in the midfield on offense and in defense trying to make aggressive tackles.

47': We work the ball down the left side after kickoff, Garmston with a pass to Armstrong who manages a shot, but its blocked.

55': A very poor tackle attempt by Ribeiro gives a penalty, its a yellow as well. I'm just not being patient on defense. Their man steps up to take the penalty, Pym dives to his left.. and saves it!!!

56': I decide to sub out Ribeiro and his yellow, RB Butterfield in.

64': We allow a pass inside from the right side, a shot is saved by Pym, there's a rebound, they get a shot off it but wide.

70': Throwin in our end, Garmston to Davies, back to Garmston, ahead to Armstrong, Garmston cuts by his man, gets the ball back, sprints into the area and has a good look... hits the side netting. Nice move though!

70': Baldwin out, CB Tillson in.

85': We manage to earn a corner after a through ball down the right side to Armstrong. Wasn't a great looking shot, but it was deflected. Corner is taken too close to the goal and the keeper grabs it.

90': Garmston forces his way down the left side, dodging one slide tackle, holding off another tackle, he gets a cross in, but the keeper gets out and punches it away. There's a rebound, its about 25 yards out, but I try to have Noble volley it back towards goal, as their keeper was a little slow getting back. Its way off target.

That's it.

Exeter 1 : 1 Sarandi

They put a lot of pressure on us in the second half, and actually outshoot us 17-4 in the end. My passing was extremely poor, and it allowed Sarandi 57% of the possession.

Man of the Match: Pym (9.8)
Goal: Oakley (6.9)
Notables: Garmston (8.0), Davies (7.3)

Both Right Backs struggled, 5.3 from Ribeiro and 4.6 from Butterfield.

Some sort of bug prevented the goal from being recorded correctly, Oakley does get credit for it, but no assist. Weird.

You can see from the rating the emphasis I attempted to put on Garmston, our speedy loanee. We'll see how that works out long term. I forced it his way a bit much, and he was a bit too careless with the ball in the midfield. Some of that is just me learning how to use that kind of speed, as he is faster than everyone else. But not fast enough to just hit the turbo button and run by everyone every play, so that's good.


Injury Update

CM David Wheeler was hurt in this match and will miss 3 weeks.

Good news though, is that CM Liam Sercombe returns from injury. I am warned by the trainers that he can re-injure himself if I play him too soon/too much. So maybe he comes off the bench next match and we see how it goes.


One last note on Garmston, the speedy LB. I obviously ran him all over the field today, and he is more tired than anyone else after the match. I may end up having to rest him more often than my other starters if I want to use him that way. That would be ok though, I could see alternating him with Woodman.

[Radii]

I have my scouts looking at more players, I'm hoping to find a couple more loan targets to try to go after, but staying open to the idea of buying someone if its right.

August 9th, 2014

Exeter vs Hartlepool

Our first league match!

GK: Pym
D: Garmston/Baldwin/Bennett/Moore-Taylor/Ribeiro
M: Davies/Noble
AM: Oakley
ST: Armstrong/Cummins

Sercombe is an injury risk, I don't want to overplay him, so I start Davies instead. I have Sercombe available and he will absolutely play 15-20 minutes today.


6': We build up down the middle, Armstrong passes out left for Garmston, he crosses into the middle, Cummins gets a head to it, parried away, we try a shot off the rebound from 20 yards out but its weak. Decent start though.

9': They use a nice give and go to earn a corner. We clear out the corner, and clear out two more crosses before finally taking possession back.

28': A tackle to the left of the area is a foul and earns us a free kick in a dangerous spot. Its taken to the far side of the area, but they win the header to get it out. We control possession and work up to a Noble cross from the right, they clear again.

36': We clear a ball out of defense and control in the midfield, Armstrong gets a pass, runs down the right, crosses into the area, Cummins gets his head to it, on target, but very weak, easy save.

38': A poor giveaway by Garmston, really our first of the match, sets up a scary shot for Hartlepool, Pym blocks it, the rebound falls to an attacker of theirs, but he's offsides.

HALF: The stats say they have 4 shots to our 2, there's definitely a but identifying some shots, I think each team has 1 or 2 more than that. Ah well. They control 55% of the possession, which it didn't really feel like in game. We could be a little more patient in the midfield I think. We were trading possession back and forth, both teams attacking a good bit, but I think we just didn't hold on to the ball enough, we tried to rush it down a side and cross too quick.

52': They get two shots, one on a cross in from the left, headed, blocked and off the crossbar. The second from some passing out front, a shot taken from inside the area, but wide left.

73': Lots of dead time here, finally Armstrong with a pass to Cummins, he makes a cut to generate a little space and shoots from just outside the area, wide right.

73': Sercombe in for Davies in the midfield.

82': They pass it around our defensive end forever, we finally make a little mistake and allow a pass into the middle of the area, but Bennett gets there in time to block the shot, corner.

82': Nichols in for Armstrong at ST, Keohane in for Oakley at AMC.

90': They get a throwin near midfield, a run down the right, cross into the area, their man wins the header over Bennett and puts it in. Nooo. 0-1

We turn on the ultra attacking mode, and we generate a late shot but that's it.

Exeter 0 : 1 Hartlepool


They end up with 10 shots to our 4, they put 7 on target, we blocked/stopped many of them though. It felt like they had better control in the second half, we had a few too many giveaways in the midfield and almost no turnovers forced ourselves. Taking better care of the ball in the midfield + being more patient I think is the lesson here.


Because of all the shots on target, Pym ends up with a 7.7 rating and man of the match. Baldwin in defense 5.9, our midfield was bad, Nolbe 5.8, Oakley 5.5, Sercombe 5.2. Gotta be better there.

[Radii]

August 12th, 2014

Capital One Cup

Exeter vs Nottingham Forest

We get a home draw here, but we have to play a squad from the Championship where we will be heavy underdogs.

GK: Pym
D: Woodman/Baldwin/Bennett/Tillson/Butterfield
M: Davies/Sercombe
AM: Oakley
ST: Armstrong/Nichols

We sub out both fullbacks, one center back, and a striker today, starting Nichols over Cummins. Defensive mindset from the start.

I set our fullbacks to not overlap, these guys are slow, and we need to hold our defense. I do set the tactic to look to counterattack.

13': We don't last long here, a really nice 1v1 move from their striker Lansbury sets him up about 8 yards away with an easy, easy finish. 0-1

17': The miracle goal!? We move forward very slowly, eventually Oakley gets a little space on the right side and puts a nice cross into the area, their defender gets up over Cummins, but he doesn't clear it, and it falls in the area to Armstrong, he hits it on a half volley, and it trickles into the net!!! 1-1

32': We give up a corner, they take a blistering long shot, Pym stops it but turns it behind. The corner is headed by one of our defenders but falls in the area, they have a man there who tries a bicycle kick, blocked, and cleared.

44': They have a really nice lob into the area and header on target, Pym gets a hand to it and turns it behind. Corner is cleared easily.

HALF: What a half! They have 5 shots to our 1, we are doing a very good job controlling possession, 52% to 48, not an overwhelming amount but we are being patient and looking for opportunities but taking our time. Lets see if we can hang in there for another half.

60': Keohane in for Oakley at AMC.

65': We concede a corner, and they get a goal, corner taken well, header by Pym. Boo! 1-2

69': Cummins in for Armstrong up front.

84': We build up down the middle, we've been able to get forward a bit but can't break through their defense at all. Here one of their defenders falls over blocking a pass, Sercombe gets to it and tries a left footed shot from 20 yards, its high. Best chance we've had in a long time though.

That's it, we can't tie it up a second time.

Exeter 1 : 2 Nottingham Forest

They outshoot us 9-3, we controlled 54% of possession though and really did rather well against the bigger side.

Man of the Match: Pym (8.9)
Goal: Armstrong (7.0)
Notables: Bennett (7.0)

Our other two center backs struggled, 5.9 for Baldwin and 5.6 for Tillson. Tillson is the 49 rated guy, he's a weak link back there.

[Radii]

I have had a loan offer accepted for a central midfielder, not a superstar level guy but someone that would likely get a lot of playing time. I'm not totally sold on it yet and am stalling before making a decision.


August 16th, 2014

Cambridge Utd (0-0-1, 18th) vs Exeter City (0-0-1, 23rd)

GK: Pym
D: Garmston/Baldwin/Bennett/Moore-Taylor/Ribeiro
M: Noble/Sercombe
AM: Oakley
ST: Armstrong/Cummins

We're able to put our best lineup out there today.

10': We build up down the left, Noble gets deep down the side and draws two, passes back to Garmston, to Oakley in the center, he finds Cummins in the area, he turns and gets a shot from close range as the keeper rushes out... the keeper just gets a hand to it, and the ball trickles wide right. Corner taken to the middle of hte area, Oakley gets his head to it but its weak and wide.

18': Noble is hurt, didn't see when or how it happened. He stays on but is clearly hobbled. I bring Davies in for him.

22': A strong volley from one of their attackers 18 yards out, but wide. We had no chance at that if he was going to manage to get it on target.

31': Sercombe ahead to Armstrong, he has to pull a little wide right to get the shot off, and sends it wide from a tough angle.

42': Some nifty play to get forward for Exeter, Armstrong holds the ball up, passes to Oakley and Oakley is unmarked about 10 yards out, but his finishing is shit, and he shanks it left. Disgusting.

HALF: I think we were the better side that half, and we clearly should have a 1 goal lead with Oakley's screw up. They do end up out shooting us 6-4, but we hold 53% of the possession. We are passing better, both teams unusually low for FIFA, 73% to 60% passing in our favor.

I switch Sercombe up to AMC. I had him playing a little further back b/c he's a little better defender, but screw that.

62': They are attacking harder in the second half, trying to take control here. We give up a corner. Pym punches the corner out and we win it back from them, briefly at least.

72': Ugh, frustrating. Cambridge has been all over us this half, more aggressive and we haven't reacted well to it. We've been defending well though, making it hard for them to get good shots off. Here we just fall apart though, they get it into the area for ST Lazioni and we can't figure out who should mark him, in the end no one does and they finally get a clean shot and its a goal. 0-1

73': Keohane in for Oakley.

80': Tillson in for Baldwin.


After the 80 minute mark they put their entire team behind the ball and we were just frustrated trying to do anything.

Cambridge 1 ; 0 Exeter

That was a shocking second half. We didn't manage a single shot. In the first half we got our chances and I even said I thought we were better. They just flipped a switch in the second half and completely dominated.

We did have a couple extremely good chances in the second half, ones I should finish if I'm a bit better. This is the same way I started out in FIFA 14, so no worries. It seems to always take me a little while to figure out how to score and how to use my players in a new version (and I don't play a lot of FIFA at all really).

We do also have the worst roster in the league, but I think it'll get better.

Injury Update

CM David Noble is going to miss 8 days with the injury he picked up today.

[Radii]

August 19th, 2014

Exeter (0-0-2, 23rd) vs Luton (0-2-0, 16th)

GK: Pym
D: Garmston/Baldwin/Bennett/Moore-Taylor/Ribeiro
M: Davies/Oakley
AM: Sercombe
ST: Armstrong/Cummins

5': Armstrong finds Ribeiro making a run down the right side, cross into the area, Cummings heads it, but weak and right at the keeper.

11': A cross in from Garmston, Oakley heads it, wide.

16': Ribeiro sprinting down the right side, looking to make another cross, he goes flying as he's tripped, its a yellow on their defender Drury. Armstrong takes the free kick, crosses in, they win the header.

25': I tell the team to attack a bit harder, we need to win this one dammit.

37': Ugh, poor defending as we miss a couple tackles and allow them to pass through the penalty box to get a shot and goal. Pym probably should have stopped it still, but he does an awful lot already. 0-1

45': Ribeiro another cross, headed well by Cummins, keeper has to dive to stop it, and there's a rebound, but they get to it and clear it. Damn!

HALF: We outshoot them 4-3, each team puts 1 on target. They actually control possession 56/44, but it doesn't feel that bad to be without the ball here, as we've gotten a number of good chances. Just gotta score dammit.

65': Cross in from Garmston, headed by Luton, but falls just outside the area, Davies is first to it and shoots, but high.

65': Oakley is out, Wheeler is in, he was hurt for a week or so, just back now.

74': Ribeiro out, Butterfield in at RB. They are getting more chances this half but nothing has been remotely close. We are trying to press more.

89': We get the ball to Cummins in the area, he turns by his man and has a great look from 15 yards out, sends it wide left. uggghh. I've got to finish some of these better.

90': Butterfield gets a cross in, Armstrong with a hilariously bad header.

Exeter 0 : 1 Luton

They end up outshooting us 11-6. Only 3 on target for them and most of their attempts in the 2nd half weren't worth mentioning. But the big thing is that we needed to find more chances than that. And we did have a couple really good ones and I just screwed them up.

[Radii]

So I kept playing but stopped writing things up b/c I felt I was just giving away every game due to shitty stick skills. I was constantly turning it over in the midfield, like literally sometimes for 60 game minutes in a row doing nothing but giving it away with a bad pass in the midfield and then defending, poorly. So I stopped writing things up and decided to just play and see how long it took to improve.

Things got better pretty much immediately. I've played into Mid-October now and am playing much better. Not great, mind you, but well enough that I'm not looking to be the last place team. I can actually make a few plays here and there, but am not above doing something boneheaded.


Stuff I figured out:

-- I've gotten a bit better at fluid offensive play. Not always, but I'm at least capable of a nice through ball or stringing together a couple passes to generate a shot.

-- My defense is improving. I was constantly overrunning players and leaving wide open holes in my defense. My positioning even on slower players is drastically improved.

-- Choosing which player to defend with is getting better. I'm staying better at keeping my back line in tact and defending outside the box with my two midfielders, or at least using my fullbacks. Less wide open holes for attackers to get into just because I am stupid.

-- I still give the ball away WAY more than I win it, but I do get the occasional tackle in the midfield and counterattack.

Lately I've actually found myself with leads a fair bit, and I'm struggling to close them out. This actually feels a bit realistic though. We're a bad team, and if the other team pushes WAY forward, we crumble sometimes. I'm ok with this.


Matches to date since the last one I wrote up:

August 23rd: Northampton 2 : 0 Exeter
August 26th: Cambridge 2 : 3 Exeter - Johnstone's Paint Trophy
August 30th: Exeter 2 : 1 Accrington
September 6th: Shrewsbury 1 : 1 Exeter
September 13th: Exeter 1 : 5 Bury
September 16th: Portsmouth 1 : 2 Exeter
September 20th: Exeter 1 : 2 Oxford
September 27th: Morecombe 2 : 2 Exeter
October 4th: Exeter 2 : 0 Stevenage
October 7th: Coventry 3 : 2 Exeter - Johnstone's Paint Trophy
October 11th: Plymouth 2 : 2 Exeter


So we've only been shut out once in this stretch. We imploded against Bury, we pitched a nice 2-nil shutout against Stevenage, and the rest have been competitive. We led Coventry 2-1 but they got two very late goals. We led Plymouth 2-1 and they got a last minute goal.


My loanee ST Adam Armstrong leads the team with 4 goals.

ST Graham Cummins has 3.

Speedy Left Fullback Bradley Garmston has 2 goals, both of them on through balls as he raced down the left side and i happened to spot him. Garmston hit the post in the 85th minute against Plymouth on a similar play, coulda given us a 3-1 lead and sealed that win.

2 goals from midfielder Matt Oakley

1 goal each from CM Liam Sercombe and backup ST Tom Nichols.


Looking at assists, ST Cummins leads us with 3. He has been pretty decent at hitting midfielders making runs by him when he gets a pass and holds the ball up.

CM Matthew Grimes, a backup rated in the low 50s, has 2 assists, both in the same match I believe. RM David Wheeler has 2. Garmston, Sercombe, and RB Christian Ribiero each have 1.



-- I thought early on there were huge problems with the game tracking assists, but this seems on target. We have only 1 fewer assist than goals, and Sercombe did score on a rebound (he shot it, keeper blocked it, he got to it first and ran it into the net) where an assist wouldn't have been given. So I'm good with that.

-- The one legit problem are saves. I remember one game where the opponent was only credited with 4 shots, 2 on target, but GK Pym had 7 saves and earned man of the match. So we're going to just pretend that doesn't happen. If Pym gets a stupid rating in goal b/c of that, we'll be ignoring it.

[Radii]

Player Acquisition

I brought in one last loan player.




I've had some problems using Seager. No goals or assists for me even though I put him in my starting lineup next to Armstrong immediately. Lately I have been playing Armstrong/Cummins more, unsure whether its luck that Cummins seems to make some plays where Seager hasn't.


One last note is that one of my top rated midfielders, David Noble, was on a short term loan (he was on the team when I started), that loan has expired, I just lost him after my last match.


We are just over 1/4 of the way through the league season, 12 matches played out of 46. Northampton have built a big early lead with 27 points from 12 matches. Hartlepool has 22. Tranmere/Wimbledon/Shrewsbury/Oxford/Bury sit in the other playoff positions currently. Bury has 19 points.

But we don't care about those guys. Lets focus on our interests, the bottom half of the table:

13. Accrington - 16 pts
14. Cambridge - 15 pts
15. York - 14 pts
16. Portsmouth - 14 pts
17. Setevenage - 14 pts
18. Dagenham - 14 pts
19. Exeter - 12 pts
20. Wycombe - 12 pts
21. Newport - 11 pts
22. Carlisle - 10 pts
23. Mansfield - 10 pts
24. Morecombe - 8 pts


We are 3-3-6, 13 goals/19 conceded, -6 differential. Given that we really, really, really struggled to score at all in our first 4-5 matches, and that we lost 5-1 to Bury, it could be a heck of a lot worse than -6 differential.


Strategy

My default starting lineup:

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (61)
CB: Baldwin (59)
CB: Bennett (60)
CB: Moore-Taylor (57)
RB: Ribeiro (62)
CM: Davies (59)
CM: Oakley (58) (c)
AMC: Sercombe (62)
ST: Armstrong (61)
ST: Seager (59)


Most Common Subs/Replacements:

ST: Cummins (58)
CM: Wheeler (58)
AMC: Keohane (57)
RB: Butterfield (58)
LB: Woodman (60)

I've also made an active effort to give some playing time to three younger guys just to see a little about player progression:

ST: Reid (53)
CB: Tillson (49)
CM: Grimes (55)


For individual player instructions, Garmston and Ribeiro at LB/RB both have the "always overlap" on attacking runs instruction on. They frequently go deep on offense and frequently make crosses and runs into the area.

Armstrong is set as a Target Man.


-- The last note is that I've messed around with a few overall tactical choices. I've settled on "High Pressure" as my favorite. Press the ball a bit more, a bit higher up, potentially weak to through balls. I've found this to work better than the counterattacking or possession tactics that are available.


Lastly, I've made no change from the 5-3-2 formation at any point. One thing I want to do to try to hold leads a little better is to switch to a 5-4-1 late if I'm ahead.

[Radii]

October 18th, 2014

Exeter City (3-3-6, 19th) vs Wycombe (3-3-6, 20th)

We're ahead of Wycombe with a better goal differential, they're at -7.

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (61)
CB: Baldwin (59)
CB: Bennett (60)
CB: Moore-Taylor (57)
RB: Ribeiro (62)
CM: Davies (59)
CM: Oakley (58) (c)
AMC: Sercombe (62)
ST: Armstrong (61)
ST: Seager (59)


We do use my default lineup today. High pressure tactic, we will start out immediately in an attacking mindset.

2': We move straight down the left side after kickoff, Seacombe finds Armstrong, shot from 18', hits the crossbar and goes over.

12': Sercombe tries a through ball to Armstrong, intercepted, but Sercombe attacks and wins the ball back before they can clear. He passes to Seager, he turns to the right and is into the area, tries a shot, but right at the keeper. We get a corner out of it, no luck.

19': Armstrong to Sercombe for a strong low shot, just wide by a foot.

29': We build up down the center, a pass out wide left to Garmston, back in to Sercombe, he hits a through ball that Armstrong gets to in the area, he just broke on it better than the defense, he hits it from 10 yards out and beats the keeper! 1-0

37': Oakley with a yellow card, given for a foul a few minutes earlier but play continued.

39': They pass it around the right corner area, we're unable to get a good clearance, there's an attempted low cross, it deflects off of Bennett and falls to an attacker Craig who shoots and scores before we can react. 1-1

41': Almost immediately after kickoff, we go straight down the field, Seager passes to Armstrong, he dodges a sliding tackle and that is all it takes, it pulls everyone out of position as a defender comes up to cover, Sercombe makes a run, Armstrong hits him with a through ball, and he finishes well. 2-1

HALF: That is probably the best half I've played. We outshoot them 9-2 and have 7 players over a 7.0 rating at the half. Armstrong and Sercombe each get one assist to the other for a goal. Our mids, Davies and Oakley, are doing a spectacular job winning the ball back before the other team fully sets up its offense. Its too bad we allowed the one goal, this could easily be 3-0 instead of 2-1.

63': We allow a cross in from the right corner, a fairly open volley, but hit wide.

-- At this point Wycombe are controlling possession a lot better, and we're at risk of giving up a goal. I have really got to figure out how to better play with the lead.

69': Two subs in the midfield, Keohane and Wheeler in for Davies and Oakley. Keohane is an AMC and I move him up there, dropping Sercombe back to defend more.

87': We win a ball in our end, a pass up to Wheeler, through ball to Armstrong, he has a half step on the defense, he's able to get a shot from about 18 yards out, but saved.

90': They send a cross through the 6 yard box, the attacker can't quite get to it though.

That's it, we held this lead nicely!

Exeter 2 : 1 Wycombe

We end up with 10 shots to their 3. We had 60% of the possession at one point in the first half, but ended up behind 54/46 for the game, showing just how much Wycombe controlled the ball. But where we've failed in the past there, we did a good job making it very hard for them to get into a position to shoot. What I need to do better is hold the ball against the pressing/aggression that comes when we have a lead, and use that to get some easy chances.

Man of the Match: Sercombe (8.6)
Goals: Sercombe, Armstrong (8.3)
Notables: Seager (7,8), Garmston (7.7), Baldwin (7.5), Pym (7.2), Davies (7.3), Oakley (7.1)


-- The win puts at 15 points, along with 4 other teams. We have the worst goal differential though, so we're in 18th.

[Radii]

Here's a goal from our draw vs Plymouth. A few games ago I would have blasted a shot wide when I first received it in the right side of the area, or crossed it over everyone and out of play. I was happy to have seen what was available and to have been able to execute it.

[Radii]

October 21st, 2014

Exeter City (4-3-6, 18th) vs Cheltenham Town (6-3-4, 7th)

ST John Marquis and LM Zack Kotwica lead them with 4 goals each. Kotwica looks like a speedster and our slow midfield may struggle with him.

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (61)
CB: Baldwin (59)
CB: Bennett (60)
CB: Moore-Taylor (57)
RB: Ribeiro (62)
CM: Oakle (58)
CM: Sercombe (62)
CAM: Keohane (57)
ST: Armstrong (61)
ST: Cummins (58)

Davies sits in the midfield, Keohane in instead. I bring Sercombe back to MC instead of AMC, he's our best midfielder and I am worried about this Kotwica guy based on looking through their roster. Cummins starts for Seager.

...

And, Kotwica is sitting today. He's played in 11 league matches, just a rest day it looks like. So much for advance scouting.

10': They get the first shot of the match, a header from a cross, Pym has to turn it over the bar, corner is cleared.

17': They control it and attack, lots of passing close to the penalty area, we can't win it away but we do hold our shape and make it tough for them. They end up with a shot from the left side of the area, Pym saves it, but there's a rebound, they get to it and shoot... off the crossbar, whew.

38': CB Bennett goes down in the area while defending a cross, and he's forced to leave the match immediately. Looks like I messed up and didn't have a proper backup ready to go. We do have RB Dawson, rated 52 OVR, ready to come in. Ugh. Bennett is our best central defender, its going to be a problem if he's out long term.

39': They have a goal called back due to offsides. Was pretty close, I thought we might be down.

43': Our first real attacking move in a very long time. We get a nice ball down the left sideline for Garmston, he crosses, but Armstrong can't win the header.

HALF: We are being dominated everywhere but the scoreboard, allowing over 60% of the possession, and Cheltenham are outshooting us 7-1, with 4 on target. Pym may legitimately deserve man of the match if this keeps up today. Our defense is holding up quite well, but we are really struggling to maintain possession or get forward with any sort of meaning.

48': We hold on to the ball out of the kickoff before moving up the left side, a pass in to Armstrong, he draws the defense a bit and gets a ball up to Oakley for a shot, but its saved and cleared.

62': Oakley out, Davies in. Oakley has run around a ton today and fresh legs will hopefully help.

65': Moore-Taylor with two big plays in a row, contesting a close range header out of a cross, and then after a rebound blocking a shot that the keeper would have never been able to get to, whew.

68': Ribeiro with a ncie run down the right, gets it to Sercombe, he is able to make a cross, Cummins with the header... off the crossbar and over.

70': We get forward with numbers after winning the ball following the goal kick. Cummins with a nice through ball to Sercombe, he's got the best shot of the game from either team so far, but he puts it high. That needed to be a goal.

72': We get it forward again, Armstrong ends up taking a very tough shot from a wide angle out right, stopped, but there's a rebound, cummins with a very difficult volley, its blocked and behind, corner. Ribeiro takes it, Keohane gets his head to it, but saved easily. Nice to see some pressure though!

82': Wheeler in for Keohane, Sercombe up to AMC.

84': Ahh, we couldn't hold out forever, they attack right down the middle and our positioning just isn't there this time, a ball into the area, Moore-Taylor is a bit to the side of his man instead of between the man and goal, and the attacker scores. sub striker Harrison is the scorer. 0-1

86': Is it that easy?! We build up, mostly down the middle, after kickoff, Cummins has it out right a little bit, a pass to Armstrong, dead center just outside the area, he turns by his man, shoots with his weak foot from the edge of the box, and its in! 1-1

They get another really good look in the 89th minute but miss. At that point I decide to try to hold things up. There's 5 minute of extra time, we pass it around for most of that, and Cheltenham seem content to let us. I try to get it forward to Armstrong to see if he has one more 1 on 1 move in him to generate something, but he loses the ball, and the game ends.

Exeter 1 : 1 Cheltenham

For most of the match Cheltenham seemed the better team, but I do think our defense deserves credit for keeping it level for so long. We did get a lot of pressure on them in over a 10 minute stretch or so, and we managed to find our goal almost immediately after they scored.

Goal: Armstrong (6.7)
Assist: Cummins (6.6)

In the end they shot 9 times to our 8, a huge improvement from halftime. They controlled 57% of the possession.

We were tied in points with a few other teams, and a couple of them lost today. We move up to 16th with the point.


Injury Update

My best Center Back, Scot Bennett, is done for the year. That's an ACL injury, 7 months. These sliders bump up injuries a bit to try to make you use your roster more and to add realism, we've seen some shorter injuries but this is the first serious one.

49 OVR CB Jordan Tillson and 58 OVR RB Danny Butterfield (who is also proficient at CB) will do their best to fill the role.

[Radii]

October 25th, 2014

Carlisle United (3-4-7, 21st) vs Exeter City (4-4-6, 16th)

Carlisle's leading scorers are LM Matty Robson with 4 and ST Wilfried Louisy-Daniel with 3. Louisy-Daniel has scored those 3 in only 5 matches. Robson might be a bit of a threat if he's playing, he's faster than my mids, but I think Ribeiro can mostly deal with him.

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (61)
CB: Tillson (49)
CB: Baldwin (59)
CB: Moore-Taylor (57)
RB: Ribeiro (62)
CM: Davies (59)
CM: Oakley (58)
CAM: Sercombe (62)
ST: Armstrong (61)
ST: Seager (59)


5': We get a free kick just outside the area, dead center. Armstrong skies it over.

13': We give the ball away poorly right after a free kick in their end, so we had a lot of men forward, they rush down the left side and we are slow to pressure the ball, they end up with a good look from inside the area, but put it well over. Whew.

16': Yellow for Davies.

20': Our best look so far, Armstrong feeds Seager, he turns by his man and gets a shot, saved. It was with his weaker foot.

31': They get a cross into a dangerous spot, but Baldwin heads it out, a follow shot is wide.

HALF: I think we have had a couple shots better than any of Carlisle's, but really overall they are playing quite well, probably a little better than us. They have 5 shots to our 4, but we have the only shot on target. We lead in possession 52/48. Carlisle are being very aggressive at intercepting passes if I don't place them perfectly, so I've given up a few too many balls.

51': They get a scary through ball into the area, Tillson makes a sliding challenge and I think alters the shot at the end, its wide. But that was Tillson's fault, he was positioned awfully.

60': Each team gets threatening shots on target, theirs is from distance, Pym stops it but can't hold it and it almost trickles into the net before we clear. Seager with a nice shot for us, but also saved.

61': Cummins in for Seager.

82': We have a 15 minute stretch where neither team can do anything at all, small buildup, turnover, repeat, without the ball going out of play. Finally there's an offsides. Wheeler in for Davies, Butterfield in for Tillson.

That's it, neither team seriously threatens.

Carlisle 0 : 0 Exeter

That might be my first scoreless draw all season. They shoot 8 times, we shoot 5, each of us puts 2 on target. Possession ends up 50/50. Both offenses were frustrated the entire time I suppose.

We drop to 17th after another draw.

[Radii]

November 1st, 2014

Exeter City (4-5-6, 17th) vs Mansfield Town (3-4-8, 22nd)

ST Liam Hearn has 5 goals for Mansfield, no one else has more than 2. We have no scouting info on Hearn. We dont' have much scouting info on Mansfield at all, but boy have they struggled.

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (61)
CB: Moore-Taylor (58)
CB: Baldwin (60)
CB: Butterfield (58)
RB: Ribeiro (63)
CM: Davies (59)
CM: Oakley (58)
CAM: Sercombe (62)
ST: Armstrong (62)
ST: Cummins (58)

Cummins and Butterfield in, Tillson and Seager out.

8': We have a throwin in their end, passed into the middle, Cummins to Sercombe, he has the ball tackled away but it goes bouncing into the area, Armstrong is there first and puts it in before the defense can react! 1-0

17': Sercombe has gotten two shots from inside the area in the last couple minutes, both from tough angles though, one led to a corner, but we get nothing out of any of it.

39': We let them back in it, a couple of our center backs got crossed up as we allowed way too much passing way too close to the goal, they found a little hole in the defense and got a nice shot and goal. AMC Clements with their goal. 1-1

HALF: We started out on fire but it feels like we've let up, or they woke up, something like that. They control 54% of possession and outshoot us 5-4, we have put all but one of our shots on target which is nice. We'll hope to come out in the second half like we did at the start of the game.

65': Each team has earned one corner so far this half, but we sure haven't come out as strong as I'd hoped.

68': We get forward after a goal kick, Garmston takes a pass and gets deep on the left side, he ends up cutting back and passing into the area instead of crossing, finds Armstrong, he loses his man and has a good shot, but the keeper saves it. Corner is cleared easily.

69': Young striker Reid in for Cummins, Wheeler in for Oakley.

75': Garmston to Armstrong, he finds Sercombe, a CB comes out for Sercombe and opens up a hole, a pass in to Reid, he's tackled, and its a penalty! Armstrong takes the penalty, goal!! 2-1

75': Lets try this defensive sub. AMC Keohane in for ST Reid, I change my formation to a 5-4-1 with Davies out left, Sercombe/Keohane in the middle, and Wheeler wide right. Defensive mindset.

87': A Wheeler shot from the right side of hte area earns us a corner. Sercome takes it, curls it away from the goal, Armstrong is there, a strong header, and by the keeper!! HAT TRICK!! 3-1

Good win!

Exeter 3 : 1 Mansfield

Man of the Match: Armstrong (9.4)
Goals: Armstrong 3
Assists: Garmston (7.6), Sercombe (8.1)
Notables: Davies (7.1), Oakley (7.3), Baldwin (7.2), Pym (7.7)

Very strong game all around, I was worried we were looking at our third straight draw when we gave up the lead in the first half, but we really did what we needed to in the second.

16 matches in and we're up to 14th place, 20 points in 16 matches. We're currently 5 points behind a playoff spot, but of course there are a lot of teams in the way.

[Radii]

November 3rd, 2014

Southend United (6-6-4, 9th) vs Exeter City (5-5-6, 14th)

We're playing on 2 days rest. We have to sit a lot of guys.

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Woodman (60)
CB: Tillson (49)
CB: Baldwin (60)
CB: Moore-Taylor (60)
RB: Ribeiro (63)
CM: Grimes (56)
CM: Wheeler (59)
CAM: Keohane (57)
ST: Seager (60)
ST: Reid (54)

Not optimistic about this.

22': They get a man down the left side, he tries a cross, blocked, but it makes it into the area anyway, they try a volley, Pym stops it. We counter quickly with a long ball, Reid finds Seager and he's into the area, clear cut chance for sure, but right at the keeper. Shouldl scored probably. But also lucky we didn't allow one.

34': We allow a free kick from the left side, they cross in, headed up into the air, they get a shot as it comes down, Grimes blocks it though.

44': We control the ball for a good while, slowly moving forward and looking for an opening. Woodman crosses in, they head it away, we recover. A pass back into the area for Keohane, he's got a pretty good look, but saved.

45': In added time, they build up down the left, we have one missed tackle that gets a couple guys out of position, a pass into the area, shot and esay goal. 0-1

HALF: Oh man that sucks, halftime is called immediately after the restart, goal allowed at the last possible moment. They are outshooting us 4-3, each of us have 2 on target. 54/46 possession lead for Southend. With this lineup I remain not optimistic about our ability to come back from behind.

64': Oakley in for Grimes in the midfield.

65': We clear out a corner but they recover, a pass back into the area, strong shot, Pym gets his hands on it, but only slows it, it deflects over/behind him and into the net. 0-2

73': CM Byrne (50 OVR) in for Wheeler.

81': We give up a 3rd goal, nothing special, a guy makes a good turn around Tillson and gets a good shot. 0-3

We give up a 4th goal near the end, they abuse the hell out of Byrne and score on a nice give and go. Oof.

Southend 4 : 0 Exeter


We fall to 16th after that debacle.

Our next match is going to be a rematch against Southend, but we get this one at home, for the FA Cup.

[Radii]

November 8th, 2014

FA Cup First Round

Exeter City vs Southend

Its a rematch, but, last match we sat a lot of starters, I expect some revenge today.

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (61)
CB: Moore-Taylor (58)
CB: Baldwin (60)
CB: Butterfield (58)
RB: Ribeiro (63)
CM: Davies (59)
CM: Oakley (58)
CAM: Sercombe (62)
ST: Armstrong (62)
ST: Cummins (58)

5': They abuse a slightly out of position CB to generate an early clear cut chance, Pym makes a great stop. Corner is cleared.

15': Armstrong to Cummins, he pulls a defender with him and hits a through ball to Oakley, he's covered fairly well but tries a shot with his first touch.. .wide.

25': There's a pass up the middle to one of their strikers, Baldwin has to sprint back to try to get in position, ST Clifford makes a very nice cut and Baldwin overruns the play, Clifford gets a shot off from the penalty spot and scores. 0-1

32': Garmston with a solid cross, Armstrong heads it wide though.

39': We allow a free kick from just outside the area, top right corner of the box. ST Clifford takes it, gets it over the wall and by Pym... great shot, damn. 0-2

HALF: Maybe I overestimated how much of our previous loss to Southend ws due to subs. These guys just seem way better than us. They outshoot us 7-3 and feel in complete control.

59': Armstrong with a pretty solid shot from 18 yards out after turning by his man, saved though.

59': Wheeler in for Davies.

65': We get a counterattack after Garmston wins a ball in our end and we push pretty quickly. Armstrong ends up putting a ball into the left side of the area for Sercombe, but he hits it with his weaker foot and you can tell, poor shot.

68': Keohane in for Oakley, Seager in for Cummins.

75': Finally! We win a header in midfield and get the ball forward quickly, Seager has it about 25 yards out, draws a CB up, turns by him, sprints into the area and gets a shot off, goal! Assist to Keohane. 1-2

90': Armstrong gets a free kick just outside the edge of the box, he puts it just a few feet high.

And that's it.

Exeter 1 : 2 Southend

We had nearly all of the possession in the final 15 minutes, but they were putting everyone behind the ball and we just couldn't find a breakthrough.

In the end we outshoot them 9-7, but a lot of that has to do with falling behind early.

Goal: Seager (6.7)
Assist: Keohane (6.7)

A couple of our defenders struggled, Moore-Taylor with a 5.5 rating, Ribeiro a 5.6. Everyone else between 6-7.

I hate getting knocked out of the FA Cup that early, from what I've read in these low level management type careers cup success is huge as far as getting more money in future years to grow.

[Radii]

November 15th, 2014

Exeter City (5-5-7, 20th) vs AFC Wimbledon (8-4-5, 6th)

Each team has scored 19 goals in 17 matches, but we've allowed 26, they've only allowed 16. ST Matt Tubbs leads them with 5 goals and is their highest performing player.

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (61)
CB: Tillson (49)
CB: Moore-Taylor (58)
CB: Baldwin (60)
RB: Ribeiro (63)
CM: Sercombe (62)
CM: Oakley (58)
CAM: Keohane (57)
ST: Armstrong (62)
ST: Cummins (58)

Tillson starts at center back instead of Butterfield, Keohane at AMC, Sercombe in the middle and Davies gets a rest today.

5': They control it in our end, after a few passes it goes to ST Rigg 20 yards out, he absolutely blasts it with his first touch and its into the upper right corner of the net... wow. Our defending wasn't that bad there. 0-1

8': We earn a corner, Sercombe takes it, Baldwin wins the header, but wide left, decent chance there.

24': We attack right down the middle, Keohane with a ball for Sercombe, he finds a little space in the area and gets a shot off, the keeper parries it away but Keohane gets to the rebound first and puts it in before the keeper can get back in position! 1-1

After a dull bit, we allow about 4 shots in the final 5 minute of the half, and are happy to hear the halftime whistle.

HALF: They outshoot us 5-3, and control a whopping 61% of the possession. They like to pass the ball around for a really long time as they try to work forward, which is always frustrating to deal with, but we did a reasonable job that half.

50': We allow a through ball and a dangerous shot, just wide. .Baldwin was providing a bit of pressure.

63': Butterfield in for Tillson in defense.

65': We build up down the left side and earn a throwin deep in their end. Garmston with a pass to Keohane on the outside of the area, he runs towards the center, by one defender, cuts inside to avoid a tackle, gets into the area and has space, shoots and scores! 2-1

69': Oakley with a tackle to win the ball in defense, we have decent numbers forward so i look to counter. Garmston with some great individual play, using his speed to get us down the pitch very quickly, he gets a cross into the area, Seager wins the header but high. Garmston beat 3 or 4 men on a run from midfield into the left corner to push that play forward.

72': A nice pass ahead from Seager to a cutting Oakley, he gets a shot but its saved. He was decently covered, not too easy a look there. Sercombe with the corner, Armstrong a header... blocked. That was actually a nice, strong header on target, darn!

78': Following a goal kick, they pass the ball back to a defender, his first touch is poor and Seager is close, Seager runs him off the ball, takes it and has a breakaway!! A sprint into the area, lines up the shot, goal!! 3-1

82': Seager out, Reid in. Sercombe out, Davies in.

86': They are pushing forward trying to get something, we win a ball in defense and pass forward quickly, a long ball from Davies to Reid, he spots Armstrong sprinting down the middle unmarked, passes it, Armstrong scores in the 1v1 situation easily. 4-1

90': Moore-Taylor with an awkward tackle attempt in the box, we give up a penalty, which they convert. 4-2

That's it!

Exeter 4 : 2 Wimbledon

This is the first time we've really properly been able to take advantage of an opponent pressing to come back from a deficit late.

We outshoot them 12-8, putting 6 on target to their 4, and cut that awful possession deficit down to 54-46 in the end.

Man of the Match: Keohane (7.5)
Goals: Keohane 2, Armstrong (6.8), Seager (7.0)
Assists: Armstrong, Reid (n/a, not enough time), Garmston (O6.9)

Moore-Taylor a 5.2 for his penalty, Butterfield a 5.7, I thought he did fine.


I think I'm going to make this my new default lineup. Sercombe is my best midfielder overall, and I think I get much more from him playing further back and fighting to win the ball back for us. Oakley is a very good mid for us, he usually leads the team in tackles, and in recent matches it seemed like Oakley would end up with 4-6 tackles and Davies on the other side would get 0 or 1. This match we see Sercombe 4/6 tackles, Oakley 3/7.

In the first half, Wimbledon's strategy seemed to be to pass it around on the offensive end endlessly, waiting for a mistake. Having Sercombe back there was huge.


Keohane's second goal for us today:

[Radii]

We moved up to 13th with our last win, with another we could get into the top half of the table.

Since we're out of all the cups already, unfortunately, our schedule is pretty simple the rest of the way. We play 5 matches a month so there's lots of rest time.

November 22, 2014

Dag & Red (6-4-8, 16th) vs Exeter City (6-5-7, 13th)

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (61)
CB: Butterfield (58)
CB: Moore-Taylor (58)
CB: Baldwin (60)
RB: Ribeiro (63)
CM: Sercombe (62)
CM: Oakley (58)
CAM: Keohane (57)
ST: Armstrong (62)
ST: Seager (60)

This will likely be our lineup for a number of matches in a row now.

HALF: Nothing I saw worth mentioning. Its raining and it seems to be causing problems. They do shoot 5 times, but none on target and none really close. The most dangerous thing was a cross that Sercombe headed out, so no shot at all. We have not managed a single shot yet. We've gotten into some threatening spots but just can't seem to put the passes together.

51': They load up men down the left side and draw our defense out a bit, then pass it around to the right and get a pretty solid shot, the first one on target all match, but Pym stops it.

66': Cummins in for Seager.

75': We continue to be completely unable to generate any offense, and finally the defense collapses, we get a lot of men foward but just give it away on a poor pass, then a missed tackle and a nice through ball lead to a breakaway and their striker Murphy makes the most of it. 0-1

78': Davies in for Keohane

89': Only our second shot, and first on target, we get Cummins a decent look in the area, but the keeper stops it.

90': We are desparately pressing here, and they are trying to hold the ball for as long as possible, we pressure them into a backwards pass towards a defender, Cummins gets a tackle on the man and we win the ball in a very favorable spot! He passes to Armstrong, into the area for Sercombe, who looks to have a clear cut chance, the keeper rushes out, Sercombe goes down, but not a penalty!? But the ball squirts away off to the side, Armstrong is there and passes it into the net that is now empty from the keeper coming out. A goal so ugly its 100% fitting for this match. 1-1

They get one final attack, they do get a shot but its a contested header that isn't close.

Dag & Red 1 : 1 Exeter

They get 10 shots to our 3, but each team puts exactly 2 on target and 1 in the net. We'll take it.

Man of the match: Garmston (7.7)
Goal: Armstrong (7.6)
Assist: Cummins (5.6)
Notables: Moore-Taylor (7.1), Baldwin (7.3), Pym (7.0)

Garmston actually makes 8 tackles today, he was huge for us. Oakley and Sercombe, after bragging about them last match, only had 1 each.

I've played in the rain before, but it really screwed me up today, passes don't travel as far, first touches seem a bit worse, and we just had no control of the ball.

[Radii]

November 29th, 2014

Exeter City (6-6-7, 14th) vs Newport County (6-7-6, 13th)

We're just 1 point behind Newport so a home win vs them would be pretty nice. Newport's Rene Howe leads them with 7 goals. ST Aaron O'Connor has 4 in games, no one else has more than 1. They have three CM's with decent average ratings in league play so far, but we have no scouting info on any of them.

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (61)
CB: Butterfield (58)
CB: Moore-Taylor (58)
CB: Baldwin (60)
RB: Ribeiro (63)
CM: Sercombe (62)
CM: Oakley (58)
CAM: Keohane (57)
ST: Armstrong (62)
ST: Cummins (58)

Despite saying I felt like I was probably happy with my lineup for awhile, I start Cummins over Seager.

8': Ugh, I have to stop falling behind early, we allow a shot from inside the area, off the post, and they get a striker to the rebound for the finish. Goal scored by Chapman, only his second in league play. 0-1

12': Garmston tries a cross, headed out, we recover, reverse play over to Ribeiro, pass to Cummins, he hits Keohane streaking into the area, great look at goal... he hits the crossbar. That should be a goal 100% of the time, ouch.

15': Sercombe is hurt, he limps off the field and we play without him for a couple minutes, he does come back on and doen't seem slowed much, he'll stay in.

25': We build up down the right, passing into the center, Armstrong turns by his man, into the area... and hits the post with a shot. Unlucky.

30': We fall badly out of position after a throwin, Baldwin comes out a bit too far looking for a tackle, they get a through ball into the empty spot and a goal. Ugggh. 0-2

HALF: Very frustrating half, we hit the post twice, play rather well overall, but have two very slight lapses and they capitalize on both immediately. They do outshoot us 7-3 and have a 55% possession edge, but it felt more even than that, we'll see if we can make a run in the second half.

60': They win a corner, cross to the near post, headed away but not very far, they win a header around 15 yards out and put it in from there... falling totally apart here. 0-3

65': Davies in for Sercombe, Reid in for Cummins.

73': Tillson in for Baldwin.

And that's it. Awful performance.

Exeter 0 : 3 Newport

We are only outshot 9-5, but boy did Newport make the most of it today.

All four guys that played CB for me today end up with ratings under 6. Davies as a backup at CM gets a 4.4, Oakley 5.7. Just terrible really. Sercombe and Oakley combined for 6 tackles out of 11 attempts, an average amount for them, just when the ball did get by them and they got set up in their offense, they found success too easily.

We drop one spot to 14th, this area of the table is crowded, it'll be hard to move up into the top 10, but pretty hard to fall below 16th or 17th too.


Injury Update

CM Liam Sercombe will miss 5 days. Not bad.

[Radii]

We have an extra week off due to a rescheduled match.

December 13th, 2014

Exeter City (6-6-8, 15th) vs Tranmere Rovers (10-4-6, 4th)

One of the better teams in the league here, while we are just inconsistent as hell. Maybe we can play our best today and steal one!

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (61)
CB: Butterfield (58)
CB: Moore-Taylor (58)
CB: Baldwin (60)
RB: Ribeiro (63)
CM: Sercombe (62)
CM: Oakley (58)
CAM: Keohane (57)
ST: Armstrong (62)
ST: Seager (60)

Seager today.

7': Armstrong gets into the area and tries to go by his man, he's pushed off the ball and loses it, I thought a penalty could have maybe been given there, no call.

10': Garmston in to Armstrong, he shoots left footed and puts it wide right.

27': They have possession but struggle to find an opening, their right midfielder ends up backing up with the ball to try to reset things, I decide to get aggressive and have Garmston follow him all the way to the midfield, he goes in hard for a tackle and makes it... coulda been a foul, easily, but not called. Garmston triggers a break, ahead to Seager, into the area, slides a pass to the other side of hte area for Armstrong who finishes easily! 1-0

HALF: Pretty uneventful after that. I try to counterattack some but dont' really make any progress. We don't allow any serious challenges the rest of the half either. They outshoot us 4-2 and outpossess us 54-46, all in all a rather uneventful half.

54': Ribeiro blocks a cross attempt, but they get it back and get another cross in immediately, a striker gets to it and volleys, but way off.

62': Armstrong holds it up outside the area, passes to Seager and breaks, Seager with the pass back, Armstrong seems to have a step on his man and I expect an easy finish, but he puts it wide. Thought that was perfect.

72': Wheeler in for Oakley, Woodman in for Garmston.

75': Keohane with a shot, running onto a ball after it was tackled away from Seager. Its blocked and earns us a corner. Corner taken to Keohane, header is high.

85': We catch them getting too many forward. After a clearance we have big time numbers, and we don't screw it up. Sercombe draws a defender, puts a ball into the area, Seager is there and he finishes cleanly with only the keeper to beat. 2-0

We face two scary situations late, Pym with one great save, and one shot off a free kick hits the crossbar.

Exeter 2 : 0 Tranmere

Night and day performance compared to our terrible loss to Newport.


Tranmere did outshoot us 12-5, but possession was about even and we executed well enough when the opportunities came. They did put 6 on target but I never felt threatened until extra time.

Goals: Seager (8.0), Armstrong (7.0)
Assists: Seager, Sercombe (7.9)
Notables: Ribeiro (7.1), Garmston (7.3), Pym (8.4....)




Our first goal. Shows how far back I sent Garmston to try to make that play (he is my left back after all), the foul he got away with, and how clumsy the execution of the rest of it looks. It was good enough though!

We remain 15th.

[Radii]

-- ST Armstrong has 12 league goals now, that's actually tied for 2nd in League 2. A guy from Shrewsbury has 13.

-- ST Cummins 5 assists are in a large tie for 3rd, 7 tops the league. Sercombe has 4, big tie for 9th.



We have two players that could decide to leave at the end of the year and sign with someone else for free if they want. RB/CB Danny Butterfield, and ST Graham Cummins. Both are rated 58 OVR and both play a fair amount. Butterfield is one of the countless players who makes $750/wk, he's willing to sign for 2 more years at the same rate, no brainer.

Cummins makes $2000/wk and is 26 years old, so I assume he isn't going to be getting better. I think if I want to commit $2000/wk to someone, I can find someone better than this. I also note that I'm starting to loanee's at ST much of the time.

GK Christy Pym (57 OVR) is also expiring this year. He's only 19 y/o, not a flight risk, but there's no need to wait on re-signing him. I offer him $750/wk for 3 more years.

Two other players are expiring this year, LB Connor Riley-Lowe is rated 46 OVR and I don't care about him. CM Matthew Grimes 56 OVR at age 19. I'm unsure on him.


December 20th, 2014

York City (5-10-6, 16th) vs Exeter City (7-6-8, 15th)

We're 2 points ahead of York and with a win could actually put a little distance between us.

6': They get a cross in and a strong close range header, but wide.

9': We win a ball in defense, Ribeiro plays a long ball ahead for Seager, he beats his man 1 on 1 and gets into the area, but he's coming from a pretty tight angle on the right, I try the shot anyway, saved.

29': We earn a corner, first one they head behind, second one they head out but we control, passing around the edge of the area, in for Armstrong, he runs down to the end line, a little cross into the 6 yard box, Keohane heads it, saved and pushed behind. This cross is taken by Sercombe, Baldwin gets his head to it... keeper dives to push it behind. FOURTH corner they finally clear out.

45': Their first serious threat all match, a shot off the post from about 20 yards out, and some confusion after the rebound, we frantically try to cover them, they get another shot from the edge of the box but its hit pretty weakly, Pym easily gets it.

HALF: We definitely feel like we should be ahead here. We have 7 shots to their 4, 3 on target to their one, possession slightly in favor of York but we usually trail there. Our midfield (including Keohane) have won 5 tackles already and it felt like until the 40 minute mark we really didn't let them set up their offense a single time.

61': We have spent most of the first 15 minutes defending. Here we are holding our lines well and making it hard for them to get a good look, but they get a nice pass to ST Penn who shoots from just outside the box, over a diving defender and its beat Pym. Great goal for them. 0-1

64': Seager a yellow on a tackle trying to win a ball back deep in their end following a turnover.

69': Cummins in for Seager, Wheeler in for Oakley, who is having an usually poor game today.

85': Davies in for Moore-Taylor, that's a midfielder in for a defender, we switch to a 4-4-2 and are going hard to try to get a goal late.

We can't get past their defense though.

York 1 : 0 Exeter

We missed our chance to get out into the lead in the first half, and York played better in the second and got the win.

York jumps over us into 14th, we drop 1 spot to 16th.

[Radii]

-- RB/CB Butterfield accepts our contract offer.

December 23rd, 2014

Exeter City (7-6-9, 16th) vs Shrewsbury (11-6-6, 3rd)

We played Shrewsbury to a 1:1 draw back in September. ST James Collins leads the league with 13 goals and also has 5 assists, CM James Wesolowski has 5 goals and 5 assists. LM Andy Robinson has 8 goals. Collins and Robinson both average over a 7.0 rating when they play. This is a very scary offense it appears.

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (61)
CB: Butterfield (58)
CB: Moore-Taylor (58)
CB: Baldwin (60)
RB: Ribeiro (63)
CM: Sercombe (62)
CM: Oakley (58)
CAM: Keohane (57)
ST: Armstrong (62)
ST: Seager (60)

The pitch looks horrible today. Its snowing, this is going to suck to play on.

4': We earn a corner, Ribeiro takes it, Butterfield goes up for a header, he's brought down, penalty!!! Seager takes it and scores!! What a way to start against a top three team. 1-0

15': Armstrong with a great through ball in between the two center backs, Sercombe runs onto it, just a half step on his man, perfect precision though to give him a great look... and he blasts it over.

24': They score after a cross and a pass from a free kick, but the scorer was offsides, WHEW.

34': They get a pass into the area for their star Collins, we block the shot though. We are defending 100% of the time lately.

HALF: We allow one great shot by them at the end of the half but its over, the commentators mention that if it wasn't snowing he probably scores. They out-shoot us 5-2 in the half, 57/43 possession, and I'm surprised that's all it is, it seemed much worse. We are just defending all the time, it really doesn't feel like we're going to hold on to this lead, but perhaps we can get a counter attack in the second half and go up 2 goals.

57': We allow them to set up their offense, a nice run sees a pass go deep on the right side, a cross through the area, and a wide open header from 6 yards out... hits the crossbar. We may just have the luck we need to win this?

74': We're hanging on to the ball slightly better, but, I don't think we're going to be scoring. I bring Davies and Wheeler in to play LM and RM, Keohane and Seager out, we go to a 5-4-1.

84': We get a free kick about 30 yards out wide left, Davies takes it, curls it towards the penalty spot, Armstrong gets to it first and gets his head on it, but its over.


We hang on!

Exeter 1 : 0 Shrewsbury

We should have lost that. They shoot 9 times to our 4 but it was so much worse than that. The number of clear cut chances they had that just were whiffed due to the weather was overwhelming. Probably 3 or 4 easy goals missed?

Seager earns a 7.1 rating for his goal, Oakley a 7.6 with 2 tackles, and the most dribbling and passing on the team both, the play went through him a lot more than normal. Pym of course is man of the match with an 8.8 rating. He's credited with 10 saves despite them only shooting 9 times. gg EA! But I'm ok with mentioning him as man of the match in this instance since we had to out-defend Shrewsbury.


We're back up to 14th, that's 23 played, so that's the halfway point of the season.


-- GK Pym accepts my contract offer.

[Radii]

December 27th, 2014

Accrington (6-2-15, 22nd) vs Exeter City (8-6-9, 14th)

We beat Accrington 2-1 at our place back in Auguest. They are struggling big time, so lets see what we can do against them on the road.

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (61)
CB: Butterfield (58)
CB: Moore-Taylor (58)
CB: Baldwin (60)
RB: Ribeiro (63)
CM: Sercombe (62)
CM: Oakley (58)
CAM: Grimes (56)
ST: Armstrong (62)
ST: Seager (60)

Grimes starts over Keohane today. He complained about playing time, and he is 19 y/o and rated almost as good as Keohane, if I'm going to mess around with player progression and playing time, he's a prime candidate to play more.

2': Well that's good. We lose the ball in our half, there's an immediate long pass ahead, and a foul by Sercombe in the area, penalty. They bury it. 0-1

18': Garmston tries a cross, they head it away, we recover, a pass in to Seager, he gets off a left footed shot from just insdie the area, wide.

32': Grimes has it down the left sideline, a pass to Oakley aobut 25 yards out, he passes to Armstrong and breaks for the goal, Armstrong passes right back, Oakley's shot is blocked by the keeper, but there's a rebound, Oakley is first to it and puts it in! 1-1

39': We lose the ball pretty deep in their end, and they are a bit slow to get a good clearance, Oakley makes a strong tackle about 35 yards from goal, a pass to Armstrong, Armstrong puts it into the area, Grimes and the keeper both sprinting towards it, Grimes gets there first though and scores! 2-1

HALF: Each team has 4 shots, but we've put 3 on target to just 1 for them. We're pretty solidly in control at the moment. Oakley is out, Wheeler in at the half, our midfield is going to be tired by the end of this one. Unsure if its b/c of how hard we've worked to recover from the early deficit, or playing on 3 days rest is finally catching up with some guys.

47': They start with it and try to attack right away. Sercombe with a tackle and he triggers a break for us, a pass ahead to Seager in the midfield, through to Grimes and he has no one in front of him about 30 yards away, he makes it into the area... and messes up the 1 on 1, keeper gets the stop.

50': Corner for Sercombe, crossed to Garmston, header is just inches over.

57': Another Sercombe tackle triggers another break for us, this time Armstrong gets it ahead to Wheeler, who also chokes on his 1v1 attempt.

70': I knew we would pay if we continued to not take advantage of these chances. They get their offense set up, an attacker sidesteps a tackle attempt by Baldwin at the edge of the box and is able to get off a shot which beats Pym. 2-2

70': Davies in for sercombe, Reid in for Seager.

75': Wow, complete collapse, we get a tackle but Baldwin makes a terrible clearance (wrong amount of power, pass went to the wrong guy), they intercept, place a nice through ball into the area, and score. 2-3

90': Very late in added time, Grimes practically runs through the man with the ball, but luckily for him, he got the ball and no foul is given, Grimes makes a move foward, hits a through ball for Reid who is cutting ahead, Reid has a 1 on 1 with the keeper, the keeper started to rush out for the ball, then stops, and ends up in an awkward position. Reid shoots, its on target, goal! 3-3

Time is called right after the restart.

Accrington 3 : 3 Exeter

We are lucky to get 1 point, but at the same time, we completely gave away 2 more in this one. Early in the 2nd half with a 2-1 lead we were playing great, our tackling was spectacular and they were pushing forward to try to tie things up. We got chance after chance to blow this match open, and we failed to do so.

Man of the Match: Armstrong (7.6)
Goals: Grimes 2 (7.2), Reid (6.6)
Assists: Armstrong 2, Grimes


We remain 14th. We're 7 points out of a playoff spot, but obviously lots of teams in the way still. If we were a bit more consistent we'd get there I think.


One of Grimes' goals today:

[Radii]

December 30th, 2014

Burton Albion (8-6-10, 15th) vs Exeter City (8-7-9, 14th)

We're 1 point ahead of these guys. Its our first meeting.

This is going to be a challenge. There was a rescheduled match in the first week of December, it was this. We played on the 20th, 23rd, 27th, now on the 30th and again January 3rd. We haven't rotated our lineup frequently and I actually have no idea if players fatigue more later in the season the more minutes they've played total. I hope so, b/c roster management has been too easy so far. We go into this match with many key players noticible lacking full fitness.

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Woodman (60)
CB: Moore-Taylor (58)
CB: Baldwin (60)
CB: Tillson (49)
RB: Ribeiro (63)
CM: Davies (59)
CM: Sercombe (62)
CAM: Keohane (57)
ST: Armstrong (62)
ST: Cummins (58)

Garmston, Butterfield, Oakley, and Seager sit today. None of them are listed as available subs. Full rest. Armstrong, Sercombe, Baldwin,and Ribeiro will all likely need rest next match (though we may force Baldwin out there anyway due to lack of depth).

17': We allow a corner, a head away the cross in, they do get two shots from outside the area, we block them both, then they recover and send it right, another cross, and a header that goes wide.

34': We watch a couple more off target shots from Burton, they are really holding the ball well, we're defending well enough to force tough shots, but we need to relieve the pressure.

45': A give and go in the area gets them a pretty solid look, Pym makes a good save, and we clear the corner.

45': We try to advance the ball, Keohane with a ball ahead for Cummins, but the defender gets to it first. The defender's first touch is a bit weak, and Cummins pokes the ball away and chases it. This is in the top right corner of the area, and as Cummins runs after the ball, he's tripped by the defender. A penalty is given! Armstrong buries it, and this is the third match in a row where the first goal has come from a penalty. 1-0

HALF: Something will have to change for us to win this. Burton Albion outshoot us 8-1, our only shot coming on the penalty kick. They control 61% of the possession. They have outright dominated us. Now, most of their shots have been fully blocked or off target, just one scary one where Pym had to save it, but still, the pressure on us is immense.

56': They get a shot from the left side, Baldwin slides in to block it, they earn a corner. We head it away, they recover and end up shooting wide from 20 yards.

68': Wheeler in for Sercombe. 52 OVR RB Dawson in for Ribeiro.

75': We've made a few nice tackles, we still aren't finding shots but we've actually reduced the pressure on us for the last 10 minutes or so. Trying to hang in there. We've only allowed 3 shots this half so far.

82': Armstrong out, 50 OVR CM Byrne in, we drop to a 5-4-1.

88': So close. We give the ball away in our end after a throwin, they cross, we head it out but they have a man there 20 yards out with a little space, he steps into the area and blasts a shot that's good. 1-1

We try to hold possession more than we look to score in the last few minutes, and get our point.

Burton Albion 1 : 1 Exeter

I can't complain. We are extremely lucky to have gotten a point out of this.

Man of the Match: Pym (8.2)
Goal: Armstrong (7.4)
Notable: Moore-Taylor (7.0)

Tillson (reserve CB) and Ribeiro with poor ratings today, everyone else is ok. They shot 12 times to our 1. We had a few crosses in but coulnd't connect on any of them to even get a chance. We were totally outmatched.

[Radii]

-- Its January, so the transfer window is open. I've been adding players to my shortlist as I've been scouting throughout the year. I don't have enough money to buy anyone, I look through my shortlist to see if there are players with expiring contracts who I may be able to get for next year.

There are a few Central Mids and one Striker who I could make offers to that would be clear upgrades when they arrive next season. My scouting numbers have apparently expired for a couple though, so I'm hoping i can get some scouting done before I pick who i want to go after.


January 3rd, 2014

Exeter City (8-8-9, 14th) vs Portsmouth (6-11-8, 18th)

We beat them 2:1 at their place earlier in the year. We rest a few more guys today, but not as many as I expected we'd need to.

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (62)
CB: Moore-Taylor (59)
CB: Butterfield (57)
CB: Tillson (49)
RB: Ribeiro (63)
CM: Oakley (58)
CM: Sercombe (62)
CAM: Grimes (56)
ST: Seager (61)
ST: Cummins (58)

Armstrong sits, Keohane sits, Baldwin sits.

6': They get a cross in from fairly far out right, a strong header, Pym makes a reflex save. We can't clear it and they get to the rebound and score. 0-1

19': Seager turns by his man and gets a shot off, its deflected behind for a corner. We end up earning 3 corner kicks total but none of them are very threatening.

40': Ribeiro makes a nice run down the right side, crosses to the far side of the area, Seager heads it down for Cummins who slams it into the net! That was a fairly spectacular goal right there. 1-1

HALF: I'm happy to be tied up after that start. They have 6 shots to our 5, 54/46 possession edge. I do think we're the better team here and should come out ahead in the end.

47': We go straight ahead after the start, Oakley finds Cummins in the area, great look, but the keeper is able to dive and stop it. Corner. Taken poorly and their keeper catches it.

64': Their right mid is really fast, he jukes by Garmston and gets a really good shot off, Pym saves, Tillson clears though.

73': Keohane in for Grimes, Wheeler in for Oakley. They are doing way better at generating shots this half. Hopefully fresh legs in the midfield will help us.

76': Wow, very pretty through ball from a solid distance for Portsmouth for a goal. They took advantage of Tillson's area (the 49 OVR player) to get a faster guy some space. 1-2

80': We're passing around the middle fairly well here, Seager finds Cummins, he gets tackled in the area, ball goes free to Garmston, the keeper is out of position, but Garmston's shot hits the post. It was at a bit of an angle but really should have scored.

84': Armstrong in for Seager.

85': Throwin in their end, Wheeler passes into the area for Keohane, he should be able to get a shot off here, but a poor first touch prevents it. Sad.

90': They get a scary counter attack, but put a clear cut chance wide. We take the goal kick long, a couple passes later Wheeler sends a ball into the area for Cummins, he has a little space, and this time he doesn't miss, we tie it up! 2-2

That's it.

Exeter 2 : 2 Portsmouth

Porstmouth really screwed up in the end not sending everyone back to defene, though it did almost pay off for them with a great counter attacking chance. If they finish that they win. They worked their offense better than us in the second half and end up with 14 shots to our 8. Three draws in a row, all of them with rather late equalizers.

Goals: Cummins 2 (8.6)
Assists: Oakley (7.1), Wheeler (6.7)
Notables: Sercombe (7.8), Ribeiro (7.3), Garmston (7.5)


Cummins first goal:





We drop to 16th as teams around us win while we keep getting draws.

[Radii]

January 10th, 2015

Bury (10-10-6, 10th) vs Exeter (8-9-9, 16th)

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (62)
CB: Butterfield (57)
CB: Moore-Taylor (59)
CB: Baldwin (60)
RB: Ribeiro (63)
CM: Sercombe (63)
CM: Oakley (58)
CAM: Keohane (58)
ST: Armstrong (62)
ST: Cummins (58)

Its raining and very wet out there, we've seen that before and sometimes it effects my play quite a bit, especially if the opponent is aggressive about looking for interceptions.

8': Back and forth possession early, we take the first shot, but its harmless.

34': No serious threats from either team for awhile. Here we get a cross in from Ribeiro, they head it away, but weakly, it falls to Armstrong who volleys it back towards the goal, wide.

40': They work forward fairly quickly after a turnover, a pass sets up a first touch shot from the edge of the area, wide, but probably the closest thing we've seen yet with any power behind it.

HALF: Neither team seriously threatens this half. We do have 5 shots, and 3 are on target, but i assure you the ones on target were very very weak efforts. 3 shots for Bury, none on target yet. Possession only in their favor 53/47, a good sign for us.

62': Armstrong is able to turn by his man and shoot from 20 yards out, its our strongest shot yet and the keeper can only parry it, but no one can get to the rebound, they clear.

63': Seager in for Cummins.

72': Davies in for Oakley

And tehre's just nothing to talk about here.

Bury 0 : 0 Exeter

Maybe we should be a little upset about 4 straight draws, but on the raod against a better team I'm not complaining. There were times where I was sorely tempted to tell the team to attack harder, but I feared coming out on the losing end.

Garmston with a 7.0 for me today. A few guys with 5.x's, inclugin Atmstrong and Seager both. Most of the team in the mid 6's though.


And with this draw we move up a spot to 15th.

[Radii]

New Signing

This is not someone we'll have available this year (at least not if the game works properly). We've signed 61 OVR ST Marlon Harewood away from Hartlepool when his contract ends at the end of the season.

This is a bit of an experiment, as Harewood is 35 y/o, so his ratings may completely tank. But, he's not a guy that relies on speed, which helped me to be willing to take the risk. He has very high strength (84) and a 70 heading accuracy that makes me think that he'll make a better target for crosses than anyone I currently have.

We'll pay him $1,250/wk for 2 years. We'll see next season how his ratings look.


That leaves me with $1584/wk available to me.


January 17th, 2014

AFC Wimbledon (11-9-7, 9th) vs Exeter (8-10-9, 15th)

We crushed Wimbledon 4-2 at our place, they were in 3rd place at the time and have been in a bit of a freefall since.

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (62)
CB: Butterfield (57)
CB: Moore-Taylor (59)
CB: Baldwin (60)
RB: Ribeiro (63)
CM: Sercombe (63)
CM: Oakley (58)
CAM: Grimes (56)
ST: Armstrong (62)
ST: Seager (61)

Grimes and Seager start over Keohane and Cummins today compared to last match. Can we get 5 draws in a row!?

14': We've been defending all match but no one has taken a shot yet, until now, they get a pass into the area and a fairly strong shot from 15 yards out, Pym stops is and we clear it.

34': We clear a ball out long and Armstrong takes it, he turns by his man at midfield and goes out wide left, making a long run, he gets down near the end line, crosses, Seager gets his head to the ball.. just wide right. He almost scored that.

45': We allow a lob pass over Moore-Taylor into one of their strikers, he gets a 1 on 1 with Pym, it is a bit wide right, but he's got a great look, but its put wide. Whew.

HALF: I'm not sure if its the opponents or if we're just not playing well lately, but it seems like we are defendig all the time recently. We allow 7 shots here and take just 1. Down 64/36 in possession. The problem here is different than recent games, the field seems too fast, and its causing us to lose possession an awful lot in the midfield. Or they're just better and its a tough road game, that's probably it.

Grimes was hurt in the last few minutes of the half. I take him out, Wheeler is in, Wheeler back to CM, Sercombe up to CAM.


66': They get a pretty strong shot but the area is crowded, we block it and its behind for a corner. Pym collects the corner.

68': Cummins in for Seager

69': We get a really nice through ball from Cummins to Armstrong, he's still a ways outside the area when he runs onto it though, the play started at midfield, and two defenders caught up and overran Armstrong before a shot seemed available.

73': We build up down the middle, Oakley sees Garmston running in from the left and sends a ball ahead, Garmston gets to it, defender is right there but Garmston is fast and beats his man, he's into the arae but at a very tough angle from the left, decides to shoot instead of cross, and its into the side netting.

73': Garmston is hurt, dunno if he got clipped from behind by the defender he beat, or if it is gonna be an ACL type injury where a guy gets hurt with no one near him at the end... Either way, he's out, Woodman in.

81': They get a nicely timed run into the right side of the area, a dangerous pass is attempted through the 6 yard box, Baldwin puts it behind for a corner.

86': Woodman gets ahead down the left side and sends a great cross in, but Cummins can't win the header, they head it away. It comes to Sercombe who protects the ball... and it apperas he's just straight up shoved in the back and has it taken away, no foul given.

And that's it.

AFC Wimbledon 0 : 0 Exeter

Two games in a row where we end up in a scoreless draw. The fans must be quite bored.

This is an instance where EA's statkeeping is just completely fucked. The final shot count is 9-2 in Wimbledon's favor. We took at least 4 shots in the second half, a couple were on headers and I think they just weren't counted at all. I have no idea.

Pym is man of the match, saving more shots than the other team took. But, he does deserve man of the match for getting out of that first half scoreless.

We controlled possession better in the second, it still ended up 56/44 for them in the end, but it was so much worse.

[Radii]

Injury Update

We had two injuries last game. The less important of the two is the only one with long term repercussions. CAM Matthew Grimes is out for 3 weeks. Garmston is ok.

Player Departure

I didn't offer ST Cummins a contract b/c at $2000/wk he was my highest paid player. Even though he plays a good bit, I am assuming I can consistently loan in better strikers, I'm also assuming at his age he isn't going to improve a lot more, so I didn't make him an offer. He's chosen to sign with Tranmere for next year. I'll have him the rest of the season.

[Radii]

January 24th, 2015

Exeter City (8-11-9, 15th) vs Southend United (12-9-7, 4th)

We've played Southend twice this year, once in cup play, losing 0:4 on the road and 1:2 at home. Let see if we can do better in our third attempt.

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (62)
CB: Butterfield (57)
CB: Moore-Taylor (59)
CB: Baldwin (60)
RB: Ribeiro (63)
CM: Wheeler (59)
CM: Oakley (58)
CAM: Sercombe (63)
ST: Armstrong (62)
ST: Seager (61)

I moved Sercombe back to CM awhile ago b/c I wanted to play better defense. Now I'm moving him up forward again since I have had a lot of trouble generating offense lately.

3': We give up three shots in the first three minutes, two straight ahead in slightly scary spots, one blocked off a corner.

10': We've now given up 5 shots, one just hit the post. 70/30 possession early.

15': They continue to get forward and now have 7 shots, here they shoot from a very tight angle on the left side, hits Pym and goes into the net... its apparently counted an own goal, looks just like he wasn't in a good position to hold it, but it kind of trickled in, so I guess that's how its counted. 0-1

25': Our first shot of the match and its a pretty good one, Seager with a ball into a little space for Sercombe, he shoots with his first touch from 18 yard sout, but high.


45': Nice cross in from Garmston but Seager heads it terribly.

45': We win a ball in midfield after a goal kick, ahead to Sercombe, their defense is mostly back but seems slightly caught out, Sercombe sends it into the right side of the area for Seager, he makes a deep run, crosses back into the center, Sercombe is there and heads it in!!! 1-1

HALF: We scored a goal, its a miracle! It was a nice goal too. They outshoot us 9-3 and have 55% of hte possession. We were able to control things a bit once they took the lead. Lets see what happens now that its tied back up.

47': We're able to move forward early after the kickoff, Wheeler gets it to Armstrong, he's able to turn by a man and shoot, but its still just at the edge of the box, and its blocked by a defender.

51': Butterfield wins a ball in defense and sends a long ball ahead, we control it and quickly get a good number of men forward, Ribeiro tries a cross, they head it but not fully clear, Oakely tries a volley, but wide.

67': Shots are almost even now, we've not really had good chances though. But we do seem to have remained in control of the game for the most part.

67': Davies in for Wheeler.

75': Cummins in for Seager.

85': We work the ball down the right, Ribeiro passes to Oakely, he gets it to Armstrong, he has a decent look inside the area, but the keeper stops it. Rebound falls to garmston, he goes wide left and crosses, Armstrong with a strong header, but over. So close.

They get their only shot of the second half in the final minutes and its a scary one but Pym makes a huge save. We get down the field ourselves after the save for one more effort, Oakley with a shot in a crowded area, its blocked and behidn for a corner. Ribeiro takes the corner, Cummins gets his head to it but from an awkward angle and its way over.

Exeter 1 : 1 Southend

That is now SIX draws in a row, and I keep finding reasons to be ok with that... the last two were road games against higher ranked teams, this one against a team that has a 6:1 goal advantage in two matches. I'm just happy we scored finally.

We end up with 11 shots each, after a 9-2 difference at the half. Down 54/46 in possession, only 5 shots on target, we had a couple we could have done better with.

Pym gets man of the match. No one but him over 7.0, but a few 6.9's from Sercombe, Garmston and Baldwin. Seager (6.4) the assist, Sercombe the goal on our side.

We're 16th after yet another draw.

[Radii]

January 31st, 2015

Exeter City (8-12-9,l 16th) vs York City (7-14-8, 18th)

We lost to York 1-0 at their place, a match I thought we could have won as we dominated early but couldn't score and then gave up a second half goal.

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (62)
CB: Butterfield (57)
CB: Moore-Taylor (59)
CB: Baldwin (60)
RB: Ribeiro (63)
CM: Wheeler (59)
CM: Oakley (58)
CAM: Sercombe (63)
ST: Armstrong (62)
ST: Seager (61)

No change to the lineup from last week.

5': Well, no dominating this early. We give up a goal in the 5th minute on the firstr shot of the match. They just had a man running horizontally, Baldwin takes a step in the wrong direction, gives the attacker space to shoot from 19 yards, and he drills it.

17': Armstrong gets into the left side of the area and shoots with his weaker foot.. wide left.

19': Good cross in from Wheeler, Seager gets a head to it, but its saved.

22': We control the ball well in their end, Seager takes a pass deep in the right side of the area, lays it wide for Ribeiro, he crosses immediately, strong header from Sercombe, keeper dives, and turns it wide, corner. Corner is headed away.

31': We get two shots in pretty short order, both wide, one from Armstrong, one from Seager. Armstrong's was almost a great chance, but the defender got a little half tackle on him to slow him down when he had the best look.

34': Great cross from Ribeiro, Armstrong heads it... hits the post, goes nearly straight up, they clear.

39': They take their second shot, a contested one from over 20 yards out, but it gets through and Pym has to dive to stop it, its a corner. Corner is taken near post, we get a head to it... a really poor one, almost an own goal backwards, it hits the crossbar, falls to an attacker, they score. Holy siht. 0-2

HALF: This is really frustrating. We have 6 shots to their 4, over half the possession, it feels lke we've been fully in control.. but they start and end the half with goals where we keep just missing.

47': Straight up the middle after kickoff, Armstrong with a ball into the area for Wheeler, he has a clear cut chance... and its into the side netting. Jesus.

64': Keohane in for Wheeler, Davies in for Oakley, Cummins in for Seager. They're defending all out now and its hard, we probably have let the same thing happen as our last match with York, fail on opportunities endlessly in the first half and then its too late.

That's it. They send more and more men back and we send more and more forward, but its just not happening. We blew this thing early.

Exeter 0 : 2 York

We missed a gimme here to open the second half, otherwise we just watch them take perfect advantage of their only opportunities in the first 45 minutes and that's all it takes.

[Radii]

New Signing

We pick up a second player who has an expiring contract for next year. 25 y/o CM Michael Tidser will be joining us from Scotland. He'll make $1580/wk.

We'll talk more about him next year when he gets here.

February 7th, 2015

Exeter City (8-12-10, 17th) vs Plymouth Argyle (12-13-5, 3rd)

This will be our third straight home match, so far we just have one point. We have to fix that. We tied them at their place earlier in the year, but they've done great to move up to 3rd place.

GK: Pym (57)
LB: Garmston (62)
CB: Butterfield (57)
CB: Moore-Taylor (59)
CB: Baldwin (60)
RB: Ribeiro (63)
CM: Wheeler (59)
CM: Oakley (58)
CAM: Sercombe (63)
ST: Armstrong (62)
ST: Cummins (58)

Cummins in for Seager.

6': Again? We open the game with a bit of a lapse and they get a nice shot to score. There's actually some scary bend to this shot, that looks like a better scorer than anyone we have. 0-1

9': We come right down the pitch after kickoff looking to get the goal back, Cummins with a good look, blocked for a corner. Corner is hit to Cummins, he heads it but high.

18': Through ball from Armstrong to Sercombe, he's 1 on 1 with the keeper after that, but his control is poor, he runs too far with it, gets too close to the keeper, and ends up taking a bit of a wild shot.

23': Solid control on the attack, Cummins ahead to Wheeler, he sends it wide for Ribeiro, a cross in, Cummins climbs up above his defender and heads it with a lot of power, its in!! 1-1

34': They get a strong shot from just inside the area, Pym saves it, corner is cleared.

37': After clearing it out we try a counter, but we don't really have men forward after the corner. Sercombe holds it up on the right side, sends it ahead as Ribeiro runs by, Ribeiro crosses, it looks like Cummins should have a good look for a header but its a bit over him. It falls to Armstrong, Armstrong goes down... no penalty given, Armstrong, Cummins, and two defenders fall over each other a bit inside the 6 yard box before Armstrong pokes it wide. That was a bit odd looking.

45': They buld up on offense and we struggle to win it away, lots of passing in the left side for them and more and more attackers seem to join in, a nice give and go gives them a good cross from the left corner, they have a man wide open about 10 ayrds out, he heads it, Pym makes a great stop. Whew.

45': They get forward again, a pass into the area, Ribeiro makes the tackle.. but a foul is given, penalty. Penalty is good, Pym dives the wrong way. 1-2

HALF: We have to stop giving up the early goals, they change everything. This was a pretty exciting half though despite just 6 shots to 3. We've proven we can score and I think we can do it again, as long as we don't blow it and allow any more.

65': We counter after winning a ball in defense, if Armstrong's first touch was better I think we get an easy goal, but he has to chase the ball down which changes the pass he can make, but he does get it ahead to Cummins who ends up with just one defender anywhere near him, he's just outside the left side of the area, no help coming. He's able to get inside his man and get a shot, keeper dives to save it and pushes it behind. Damn! Corner is headed by Baldwin, but right at the keeper.

72': Seager in for Armstrong (cummins has made everything happen up front today). Keohane in for Oakley, Keohane to AMC, Sercombe back.

79': Garmston with great control to get a cross in between two defenders, Seager gets his head to it.. hits the crossbar, saved.

And we just can't get it done.

Exeter 1 : 2 Plymouth

We had some players that played great today. 7.5 rating from Cummins with our goal, 7.7 from Ribeiro with the assist, Sercombe 7.6, Garmston 7.0. But some awful play from Oakley (5.8), Seager (5.5), and Moore-Taylor in defense (5.8). Interesting mix.

We drop to 18th and have now gotten 3 points in our last 5 matches. Its been a real long time since Armstrong has scored now.

[Radii]

Still trying to figure out the best way to write this up (full game reports for all 46 games seems too much, and the constant pauses to write seems to detract from my play), but with nothing to play for the rest of the year and not much money for now it seems very clear that we just need to blast through the season and see what happens going into next year.

Results since the last match:

Feb 14th: Stevenage 1 : 0 Exeter

Feb 21st: Newport 1 : 1 Exeter

Feb 24th: Dagenham 1 : 0 Exeter

Feb 28th: Exeter 0 : 3 Northampton

March 3rd: Luton 0 : 0 Exeter

March 7th: Cheltenham 0 : 2 Exeter

For anyone counting, and I assure you I am, that ended a 13 match streak without a win.

March 14th: Wycombe 0 : 1 Exeter

March 21st: Mansfield 4 : 2 Exeter


With 5 goals in our last 3 matches hopefully we've remembered how to score.

With 39 played, we are 10-14-15, 41 goals scored/51 allowed, 44 poins. We're in 18th. There's no league below this so we can't relegate, but I do desparately want to avoid the bottom few spots anyway. It seems we ought to be able to do that.

Armstrong has scored a couple in this run to get out of his slump, but he's fallen off the pace of the league leaders. Armstrong has 17 league goals, good for 4th in League 2. The leader has 22, followed by a guy with 20, then 18.


Garmston leads us with 6 assists, which is good for 8th in the league. The leader has 10. I've been able to use Garmston's speed well in our last few games, maybe I've finally figured that out too.

[Radii]

March 28th: Exeter 0 : 2 Carlisle

April 4th: Exeter 1 : 1 Cambridge

April 11th: Hartlepool 1 : 1 Exeter

April 18th: Exeter 0 : 1 Morecambe

Apil 25th: Oxford 1 : 1 Exeter

May 2nd: Tranmere 0 : 1 Exeter

May 9th: Exeter 2 : 1 Burton Albion


Plymouth makes a huge late run to win the league, Northampton 2nd, Bury 3rd. They promote. Southend, Shrewsbury, Newport and Portsmouth will play for the final spot.

Exxeter finish 12-17-17, scoring 47 goals and allowing 61. Good for 17th place with 53 points.


Armstrong ends the season with 18 league goals, tied for 3rd in league 2. 23 goals led the league. Garmston is tied for 8th in assists with 7.


Team Stats - Goals

1. Adam Armstrong - 18
2. Graham Cummins - 8
3. Ryan Seager - 6
4. Liam Sercombe - 5
5. Matt Oakley - 3
6. Bradley Garmston - 2
7. Jimmy Keohane - 2
8. Tom Nichols - 1
9. Jamie Reid - 1
10. Matthew Grimes - 1


Team Stats - Assists

1. Bradley Garmston - 7
2. Graham Cummins - 5
3. Liam Sercombe - 4
4. Adam Armstrong - 4
5. Ryan Seager - 3
6. David Wheeler - 3
7. Matthew Grimes - 3
8. Christian Ribeiro - 2
9. Matt Oakley - 2
10. Jimmy Koehane - 2

Reid and Davies had 1 each.

Team Stats - AVerage RAting

1. GK Pym - 7.4
2. LB Garmston - 6.9
3. ST Armstrong - 6.8
4. CM Sercombe - 6.7
5. ST Seager - 6.5
6. RB Ribeiro - 6.5
7. ST Cummins - 6.4
8. ST Nichols - 6.4
9. CB Baldwin - 6.4
10. CM Oakley - 6.3


-- ST Graham Cummins will be leaving us, despite being one of our better performers.

-- CM Matt Oakley is retiring

-- ST Ryan Seager is on loan, so he'll be leaving

-- ST Adam Armstrong is on loan

-- CM Paul Tisdale is retiring, there's a reason you've never heard that name. 39 OVR.

-- LB Bradley Garmston is on loan from West Brom, so he'll be leaving too.

-- CAM Keohane has been complaining about being homesick, so I'm not sure what that means, his contract isn't up but he may ask to leave.

That's a lot of games we'll have to find replacements for next year. Of course, we expect to loan in a couple more guys next season. The speedy fullback is something I *really* like.

With that its just about July, so we'll see what happens as we turn into the next season.

[Radii]

As the season ends, I'm told the board will be reviewing my performance.

Also, CM Keohane requests to leave the club because he's home sick.

-- The board is happy enough with our season, we met their expecations with a mid-table finish. They do tell us that they hoped for a little more cup success.

New Budget

Uhh? So I had read somewhere that part of your budget is based on how much money you spent in previous years, I wonder if I am getting screwed (or maybe held in check) from not actually buying players and loaning them instead. We're given a transfer budget of $325,000 and a wage budget of $1,600... that's compared to $400k for transfers last season, and $21,000 for wages. That seems problematic.

-- While restricting our cash flow, the board also decides this is the year we should go ahead and fight for promotion out of League 2.

Maybe I'll be buying players (a player? That isn't much money!) this year instead of loaning.


We initially have 22 players on the roster but that's before contracts expire it looks like, we still have Cummins and haven't pulled in the new signings we made.

-- Oh, that's because it was still June 30th.

-- We advance a day and that sorts itself out.


So lets look at the team:

GK:

Christy Pym - 20 y/o - 58 OVR
James Hamon - 20 y/o - 47 OVR

Pym was good enough for us last year. Assume the same this year.

RB:

Christian Ribeiro - 64 OVR - 25 y/o
Danny Butterfield - 56 OVR - 35 y/o
Aaron Dawson - 52 OVR - 23 y/o

Butterfield is retiring after this year. Ribeiro is valued at $650,000. I may try to sell him to see how much transfer money I'd get.


CB:

Pat Baldwin - 60 OVR - 32 y/o
Jordan Moore-Taylor - 59 OVR - 21 y/o
Jordan Tillson - 49 OVR - 22 y/o
Scot Bennett - 62 OVR - 24 y/o

Baldwin is retiring at the end of the year as well, despite only being 32 years old.


LB:

Craig Woodman - 59 OVR - 32 y/o

We had a 40-something rated backup LB that we didn't bother re-signing last yera.


CM:

Liam Sercombe - 65 OVR - 25 y/o
Michael Tisder - 62 OVR - 25 y/o
Jimmy Keohane - 59 OVR - 24 y/o
David Wheeler - 59 OVR - 24 y/o
Aaron Davies - 59 OVR - 31 y/o
Matthew Grimes - 58 OVR - 19 y/o
Alex Byrne - 51 OVR - 19 y/o
Jason Pope - 48 OVR - 19 y/o


Tisder is one of the two players we signed at the end of their contracts. We did well in landing him. Sercombe is the best player on the team and is valued at $750,000. With $750,000 we could buy 2 players rated 60-62 OVR.

Keohane is valued at $220,000, and has asked to be transfer listed. We'll do that and see how it goes.


ST:

Marlon Harewood - 59 OVR - 35 y/o
Tom Nichols - 58 OVR - 21 y/o
Jamie Reid - 56 OVR - 20 y/o
Ollie Watkins - 51 OVR - 19 y/o
Matthew Jay - 48 OVR - 19 y/o

Harewood is the other guy I signed when his contract expired. I new that was a crapshoot b/c of his age, and indeed he will be retiring at the end of the year. But without Cummins and my loaners, he's my best striker, so that's still worth it.

[Radii]

Comparing to last year:

GK Pym +2 (56->58)
RB Ribeiro +3 (61->64) - Age 25
RB Butterfield -2 (58->56) - Age 35
CB Moore-Taylor +3 (56->59) - Age 21
CB Baldwin +1 (59->60) - Age 32
CB Bennett +2 (60->62) - Age 24

So players that play a lot will improve, for a good long while it seems. CB Tillson is still 49 OVR and he played some but not much. So turning a guy from the 40's or low 50's into something useful probably won't happen, but a guy in the mid-50's, if he can be sustained in the roster, seems like he can.

Jordan Moore-Taylor went from 56->59 OVR at age 21.

Similar story for the midfielders that played the most in that age range. Sercombe, Wheeler, Keohane all showed noteworthy improvement. Matthew Grimes at age 19 I fit into the lineup when I could, until he got hurt, and he shot up from 54->58 OVR.


ST Jamie Reid went from 52->56 OVR at age 20 up front, Tom Nichols from 55->58 OVR at age 21, and neither of them played that much. So maybe its not all about playing time, I did work them into games a little more than say Tillson at CB.


This does make me think that loaning in players like I did last year, unless I can find something very specific and great (like the 85+ speed of Garmston) is probably not worth it to bring in a guy who is rated less than 5 OVR better than younger guys I have right now.

Looking at last year, for example, Garmston was worth it. Armstrong pushing Nichols from a starter to my #3 ST was worth it. Seager on the other hand was not worth pushing Cummins out of the lineup and Nichols all the way out of the depth chart.



-- This info may be easily available, but I've been winging it and learning as I go.

[Radii]

Uhh? So I had read somewhere that part of your budget is based on how much money you spent in previous years, I wonder if I am getting screwed (or maybe held in check) from not actually buying players and loaning them instead. We're given a transfer budget of $325,000 and a wage budget of $1,600... that's compared to $400k for transfers last season, and $21,000 for wages. That seems problematic.

To clarify, my actual wage budget this year is $19,350/wk. So it did go down, but when I selected the team at the start I got presented different numbers (wages available vs total wages allowed) in the same way, so I got confused. So my budgets did go down and I should buy a player to prevent that, but its not as drastic as I initially was remembering at all.


-- I check on our loaners from last year. LB Garmston got a new deal for $6,000/wk, we can't afford to loan him back in.

-- ST Adam Armstrong was making $2,250/wk when we brought him in last year, he's at $4,000/wk now. He's loan listed, but it seems like that'd be a bad idea given the way the finanacials seem to be working here. Though if we sell a player I could consider a loan, there would likely be cheaper options than Armstrong with just as much talent.


I have a lot of people on my shortlist. LB is clearly a priority, we don't even have a backup there. I have one guy on my list who would look real good for me at LB, I make an enquiry.

I also enquire about a CB who could rotate with my starters and take over for Baldwin when he retires.

Until we sell Keohane and/or Sercombe and find out how much our funds go up, we really have no other options.

I do look through my shortlist to see if there are any free agents, as some guys I put on there b/c their contracts were expiring. No free agents, they all got signed.


-- We get an offer immediately for Jimmy Keohane of $180,000. He's valued at $220,000. He's homesick and wants out, but its like July 2nd... I counter for $250,000 and wait.

-- In addition to the CB and LB I mentioned above, there is a 56 OVR CAM with 80 accel/80 sprint speed that I could get for almost nothing. He's 80 years old. I *have* to sign a left back, but I have to say that I'm pretty tempted to buy this guy and alternate him with Matthew Grimes at Attacking Mid all season.


Player Sold

CAM Jimmy Keohane is solde to Crewe Alexandria for $190,000. We get $140,000 of that added to our transfer budget. Keohane also made $750/wk so we can pay a little more as well.

-- We get an offer for Sercombe for $625,000. I counter with $825,000 and a few days later that offer is accepted. Oops? Should I have gone higher?


Player Sold

My best player, CM Liam Sercombe, has been sold to Middlesbrough for $825,000. $625,000 is added to my transfer budget.


Budget Update

As much as I hate letting Sercombe go, it seems like it should clearly pay dividends. Using the budget slider with the extra money we've been allocated, I could go as high as $1.25 Million for transfer funds (but have zero wage budget), or drop the transfer budget to $0 and add $24,000/wk in salary. A middle ground of $800,000 in transfer funds leads to a wage budget of $8,600/wk in allowances.

I set it there for now and am currently scouting a bunch of "pacey" left backs (that's the sort option I told my scouts to use).

[Radii]

With the extra money we now have I open things up a bit, offering a guy who can play CB/RB and would develop nicely with us, some of my LB scouting starts to come in, and I have a couple Scottish CM's I had my eye on that I make offers to.



-- We hit the end of July and our first friendly comes up. As tempted as I am to blow through it b/c the transfer market is getting interesting, I need to see how the team looks and see what Tisder and Harewood feel like.

Our current lineup is about the same quality as the one we started last year with. Defense is a bit better, offense is the same. The difference is that I'm probably not going to be bringing in two strikers that are upgrades, and our depth is poorer.

GK: Pym (58)
LB: Woodman (59)
CB: Moore-Taylor (59)
CB: Bennett (62)
CB: Baldwin (60)
RB: Ribeiro (64)
CM: Tisder (62)
CM: Wheeler (59)
CAM: Grimes (58)
ST: Harewood (59)
ST: Nichols (58)

We end up losing 4-1 (Friendly, not planning on typing out crap here) to brentford. They're a league ahead of us. We actually got out to the 1-0 lead and struggled hard once they started pushing. Goal was on a pass from Harewood to Nichols, Nichols headed it in.


-- Our next Friendly is just a few days away and I sim that one, one game with the new guys is enough apparently!

Injury Update

CB Pat Baldwin has a broken finger and is going to miss 5 weeks. Doh! Well, we still have Butterfield and Tisdale, and I am working on bringing in someone else in defense.


New Acquisition

We bring on CAM Fred Onyedinma from Millwall. He's 18 years old and rated 56 OVR. He's got 80 accel/80 speed which is faster than anyone else in our midfield now that Sercombe is gone. His ball control and dribbling are in the normal range for someone like this, 63 and 64. His short passing at 60 is a little low but not unheard of. His finishing is poor and we'll be looking to have him distribute the ball to Harewood/Nichols/Reid more than anything.

Onyedinma is going to make $1,500/wk and will likely rotate games with Grimes in a literal every other game rotation, at least early on.

The reason I jumped on this is that I was able to get him for $80,000. We loast Oakley, Keohane and Sercombe out of our midfield, those three started for us together 5 or 10 times I think as a unit, and we brought in only Tisder to fill the gap so far. This pickup seems a no brainer.




-- I have a transfer offer accepted for the perfect LB for me. Before I can finish the signing though we hit August 10th or so when its time for league play to start. I can't go simming league matches just to finish the transfer now, so I'll have to stop here for now.

-- Additionally, RB Ribeiro asked me for a raise. He's now my highest rated player with Sercombe gone so I was worried about how much he'd want... he asked for a raise from $750/wk to $1050/wk. Sure thing dude.

[Radii]

August 8th, 2015

Exeter City vs Fleetwood Town

Opening Day!

GK: Pym (58)
LB: Woodman (59)
CB: Moore-Taylor (60)
CB: Bennett (62)
CB: Butterfield (56)
RB: Ribeiro (64)
CM: Tisder (62)
CM: Wheeler (59)
CAM: Grimes (58)
ST: Harewood (58)
ST: Nichols (58)

Butterfield is in for the injured Baldwin at CB. Baldwin is good and that will hurt for a bit.

19': We attack down the left, earn a throw as a cross is blocked, another is headed out but we recover it. We pass it around and back left again to Woodman, he cuts inside, crosses, Harewood is there at the 6 yard box, wins the header, its a goal! 1-0

24': Woodman is tackled in the area cutting inside and looking for a shot, but no foul given.

36': They're able to get a good number of passes around the right edge of the box, we're covering well though and nothing is open, a pass to the center generates a shot, Pym dives and stops it. They get a header off the corner but high and wide.

HALF: We withtstand one more attack to end the half and take our 1-0 lead to the locker room. Once we took the lead it felt like Fleetwood turned up the pressure, I want to try to hold the ball for longer in the second half when we win it, we pressed pretty hard and gave up way too much possession there, 61/39 in their favor. 7 shots to 3 for them as well. All of ours were on target.

65': We are doing a better job of holding the ball, possession totals are down to 56/44, and they have only shot twice so far. Here Tisder makes a nice stutter step move to get by his man and get into the area, he tries to pass across the goal to Nichols charging in, but Nichols went offsides.

65': Davies in for Wheeler in the midfield.

71': CM Byrne is in for Harewood. I move him back into the middle between Davies and Tisder, so we're in a 5-3-1-1 basically.

.. we gave up a couple shots in the final 20 minutes but I was in a rush to finish so didn't pause to write anything else. We did hold on to win. We got out-shot 11-5 in the end, we held possession much better in the second half and made them chase a bit.

Exeter 1 : 0 Fleetwood

[Radii]

A note on tactics, I was getting very frustrated with the behavior of my teams vs CPU teams last season and experimented some with tactical options. Even the "High Pressure" canned tactic would see us allow the other team to get into the final third and just pass it around forever, while many of our opponents are extremely aggressive about intercepting weak passes, challenging the ball in the midfield, etc. So we just played too many games where we would try to rush down the field and score, but if we didn't, they would hold the ball for 5 minutes. And sometimes I'd make a stick error in the midfield, and they'd hold the ball for 5 minutes.

I am now using a custom tactic:



It may get tweaked. Its really, really aggressive, but so far the result has been mostly what I want. We are now challenging for balls in the midfield with much greater frequency. I am not seeing instances where an attacker gets a single step behind a midfielder and the midfielder just stops like "eh, the defenders will handle that now", which was happening before.

This is supposed to be risky, and against better, and most importantly faster teams I think we'll have to settle into a default tactic instead, but I'm using this when I can and the game feels much better, I've had possession edges at halftime in a couple matches, etc.

I think the Free form settings are helping too. If we start allowing too many easy chances or if all the running around and pressuring causes too much fatigue we'll either come in and out of this tactic during the game and have spots where we just look to counterattack, or dial it back just a little.

[Radii]

-- The guy I considered the perfect left back (of players I found in my price range) plays in Scotland for Kilmarnock (sp?). They accepted a $400,000 transfer offer, and I offered him $2,000/wk, his current salary. He likes where he's at though and wants to stay. I'm trying to offer him $3,000/wk. He's not like super spectacular or anything, but I *think* I would rather spend on an end to end athlete at fullback than on a striker given my playstyle and how last year felt.


Before that gets resolved though:

August 11th, 2015

Capital One Cup

Exeter vs Bradford

Bradford is in League 1. I think advancing in this tournament is where we can make the most money and thus get the best chance to progress. So this is a huge, huge match for us.

GK: Pym (58)
LB: Woodman (59)
CB: Moore-Taylor (60)
CB: Bennett (62)
CB: Butterfield (56)
RB: Ribeiro (64)
CM: Tidser (62)
CM: Wheeler (59)
CAM: Onyedinma (56)
ST: Harewood (58)
ST: Nichols (58)


Just the attacking midfielder change today. We'll start in a defensive mindset.

19': Just one shot for them so far, they're better than us but our aggressive defending is holding them back. We are having trouble getting forward and holding up play though.

32': They get a good look after a long ball, we built up and got men forward, and our defense defends pretty high in this tactic, they win a header on a long kick from the keeper and it generates a good shot from 18 yards out, but its high.

45': They get a couple men forward and counter us pretty hard, a striker makes a couple nice moves, dodges a couple tackles, and gets a close range shot off. Pym stops it, but it trickles away, they get to it again, Pym dives for it, but pushes it in himself, its considered an own goal. 0-1

45': Extra time runs longer than I thought it would, they use their superior speed to get a corner and score on a header off the corner. 0-2

HALF: Davies in for Tidser, Reid in for Harewood. They control only 54% of the possession but they use it well, 7 shots to our 3, 3 on target for 2 goals. They are just a bit faster than us everywhere, so every mis-step is punished.

The second half isn't worth talking about. Each team had a couple chances, but they defended a lot, we generally either had to try random desparate shots b/c we were sort of close to the goal, or had passes picked off by 7 guys in the box.

Exeter 0 : 2 Bradford

Two years running that we don't get out of the first round of the Capital One Cup, too bad. We need a draw against a league 2 opponent.


Player Acquisition

Welcome 24 y/o LB Chris Chantler to the squad.



Not Garmston speed, but fast enough, way way faster than Woodman, faster even than Ribeiro. Better crossing and ball control and passing than Woodman, better tackling too, though slightly worse marking.

We paid a $400,000 fee to Kilmarnock, and will be paying Chantler $3,000/week. That leaves us with $313,000 in transfer funds and $3,830/wk in wages. We could at this point go hard for a loaner at striker, or look to buy another player that could make an impact.

I can adjust that to $400,000 transfer/$2,000 wage, or as high as $9,000/wk wage if i wanted to try to get an EPL loaner. I had been holding off on making any other moves until I got my LB.

[Radii]

August 15th, 2015

Hartlepool (1-0-0, 1st) vs Exeter (1-0-0, 7th)

Its early, 2-0 would be nice though, wouldn't it?

GK: Pym (58)
LB: Chantler (61)
CB: Moore-Taylor (60)
CB: Bennett (62)
CB: Butterfield (56)
RB: Ribeiro (64)
CM: Davies (59)
CM: Tidser (62)
CAM: Grimes (58)
ST: Harewood (58)
ST: Reid (56)

We rotate Reid in at ST, Grimes at CAM, Davies starts over Wheeler and our new man Chantler at LB. Lets give it a go.

9': Chantler starts the play with a tackle in our end, passes ahead to Grimes, ahead to Harewood still down the left, we have them out of position, Harewood puts it into the area for Tisder, he shoots.. but the keeper was rushing out and gets right in front of him for the block. Good play though.

14': We allow them to build up down the left side, there's a low cross into the area, a first time shot from just 8 yards out... Bennett is there to pressure a bit but its still a great look, but wide.

17': We win it in the midfield, its sent left to Chantler, he runs into the offensive end, passes to Harewood, Harewood spots Reid on a run, passes into the area, its a 1 on 1 with the keeper, Reid doesn't hit it hard but places it well, its in!! 1-0


22': They pass it around our area with ease, make a pass into the right side, crossed to the far post, they get a man above Butterfield to head it, but its off the post and wide, scary.

42': We get a free kick near midfield, pass it short, Reid gets it to Tisder near the edge of the area, he holds it as Grimes runs into the area, cuts right, gets a good shot off, the keeper has to push it away, corner. The corner is taken by Davies, its into the 6 yard box, the keeper punches it up into the area, Harewood gets to it and heads it in the general direction of the goal, its not in, but Grimes is there to clean it up and pokes it in....... but offsides is called, no goal. Noooooo.

43': They get quickly downfield on their free kick, a couple passes down the riht, a missed tackle and they get a shot from 20 yards out dead center after a centering pass. Its by everyone, but hits the crossbar.

45': Yellow for midfielder Woods for Hartlepool. Ribeiro sends the free kick into the area from 40 yards out on the right side, its headed up into the air, but they clear it.

HALF: Exciting half, we gave up a coupel good chances, but we also should ahve 2 or 3 goals. We do look like the better team, 6 shots to 2, 4 of ours on target. Chantler has made a couple nice tackles in addition to helping us get it down the field quickly. I like this guy.

48': Ugh, they pass it around after kickoff, slowly building up, there's a through ball into the area from 35 yards, Bennett breaks wrong on it to try to intercept it, it gets into the box, Pym rushes out, but the attacker pokes at it just before Pym gets there and gets it in. 1-1

70': Wheeler in for Davies.

80': Nichols in for Reid, Onyedinma in for Grimes. We're giving the ball away in the middle too much here this half, but doing a good job holding them off.

And that's it, the final 25 minutes or so were really the two teams trading possession in the midfield, each of us had tons of chances to turn those turnovers into something, but we just kept trading the ball.

Hartlepool 1 : 1 Exeter

We end up outshooting them 7-6, they only put 1 on target all match, but its the goal.

Chantler earns a 7.6 rating and man of the match in his first appearance for me. Tisder 6.8, Reid 6.7 with the goal, Harewood 6.7 for the assist.


-- We get an offer of $130,000 for LB Craig Woodman. Woodman is 32 years old, but I really probably should keep the depth here.

[Radii]

August 18th, 2015

Exeter City (1-1-0, 8th) vs Crewe Alexandria (1-1-0, 7th)

We have some guys noticibly tired on 3 days rest here.

GK: Pym (58)
LB: Chantler (61)
CB: Moore-Taylor (60)
CB: Bennett (62)
CB: Tillson (49)
RB: Ribeiro (64)
CM: Tidser (62)
CM: Wheeler (59)
CAM: Onyedinma (56)
ST: Nichols (58)
ST: Reid (56)

Nichols, Onyedinma, Wheeler, and Tillson are in for Harewood, Grimes, Davies, and Butterfield.

19': So far we've tried 3 fcrosses into the area, just nothing available on them though. Here Ribeiro wins the ball with an aggressive tackle and starts the counter, Onyedinma spots Nichols making a run, fits it in to him, he's got a half step on his man, the keeper comes out... Nichols gets to it first, the keeper gets a hand to it as he's diving forward, the ball continues on, but its trickled just wide after the deflection. Corner. Corner goes nowhere.

29': We give up a corner on a cross attempt, corner taken near post, they get a head to it, off the post, but stays in play and the rebound falls to a Crewe player for the easy goal. 0-1

HALF: We allow two shots near the end of hte half but both off target. They have 5 shots to our 2, we had a lot of success getting down either side to cross, but none of them were connecting at all, we don't really have a big threat to head it in if the ball is contested. We'll have to try something different in the second half.

51': We go straight up the middle after a throwin, Nichols gets a pass 20 yards out, he's able to make one man miss, shoots from the edge of the area, but puts it high.

56': A pass in from the right gives Reid a decent look, keeper has to parry it behind. We can't do anything on the corner.

65': Harewood in for Reid. Davies in for Tisder.

75': We're struggling the last few minutes, allowed 3 shots and tons of possession deep in our end, we need to get this out.

We just can't do anything once they sit back to defend, and really they made it very very hard for us to win the ball back once we lost it, we didn't have enough of the ball in the final 25.

Exeter 0 : 1 Crewe

Chantler and Ribeiro both with good ratings, 7.5 and 7.4, no one else was close to that, a few 6.7's in the midfield. The strikers struggled though, 6.0 Nichols, 6.0 Harewood.


Hm, uh-oh? The board tells us that today's result is disappointing and we may want to experiment with team dynamics and find a way to win our next one.


-- We've now gotten 3 offers for LB Woodman. I decide to start countering them for more than he's worth. I'll sign a $750/wk free agent to replace him and hope Chantler doesn't get hurt.

[Radii]

Loan Acquisition

I had a few options here... loan in two players, buy another player, hold my money until January, or loan in one big player.



Hope is a scorer, pure and simple, at least he'd better be at this level. Compared to Armstrong when we brought him in last year, Hope is faster, positions better, is a better finisher, can shoot from distance and has an incredibly powerful shot for this level, no one I've seen comes close to that 80 from him.

He lacks dribbling, passing, and agility compared to Armstrong from last year.

Hope comes to us for the year from Everton. He makes $9,000/wk. So that's our big signing, and we're done for the year unless we sell someone else. I believe if we do it right, Hope can lead League 2 in goals this season.

[Radii]

August 22nd, 2015

Mansfield (0-1-2, 22nd) vs Exeter (1-1-1, 12th)

GK: Pym (58)
LB: Chantler (61)
CB: Moore-Taylor (60)
CB: Bennett (62)
CB: Butterfield (56)
RB: Ribeiro (64)
CM: Davies (59)
CM: Tidser (62)
CAM: Grimes (56)
ST: Hope (64)
ST: Harewood (58)

First game with the guy that better be our new star, or else.

9': Harewood gets a pass at the top of the box, turns wide and around his man, gets a shot, keeper has to make a diving save and its cleared to the side for a throw.

29': What a horrible mistake, Davies holding onto the ball in right around our own third, waiting for someone to free up/make a run, and the defender closest to him makes an aggressive play, runs his shoulder into Davies, runs him off the ball and takes it, no foul given, and maybe none deserved really. Two passes later they get a clear cut chance from 18 yard sout and score. 0-1

36': Hope takes his first shot, its blocked. Did most of the work to generate it himself.

42': Chantler makes a nice move to get by his man, passes it further down the left side for Davies, Davies a nice cross, Harewood heads it... keeper gets a hand to it, I thought that was a goal. Corner, which goes nowhere.

HALF: Its a fairly even half, we just had one awful, awful giveaway in our end that led to a goal. We outshoot them 4-3, 3 of ours are on target, a couple with a little threat, gotta do more though.

60': Good cross to the far post from Chantler, Harewood gets his head on it but its high.

70': Wheeler in for Davies.

81': Throwin on the right side, we spot Tisder in the left side of the area and cross it over to him after the throw, he lays it into the center for Hope, Hope hits it left footed first time, and its by a diving keeper and into the left side of the net!! 1-1

83': Woodman in for Chantler

88': Woodman gets a cross in for Harewood, he heads it.. wide. Oh wait, deflected, corner for us.

90': Byrne in for Tidser.

That'll do it.

Mansfield 1 : 1 Exeter

Mansfield went all out defense mode after we tied it up, they were terrified of giving up more. We actually connected on a few crosses today, Harewood is my best man in the air, he's in a different role with Hope as target man up front (target man here means set up for balls to the feet, apparently), so maybe this gets Harewood more chances on crosses.

We outshoot them 9-7, putting 5 on target, just 1 on target for Mansfield, and it was off a terrible misplay.

Chantler is man of the match with a 7.5 rating. Hope a 6.8 with the goal, Tidser a 6.6 w/ the assist.

[Radii]

August 25th, 2015

Johnstone's Paint Trophy

Leyton Orient vs Exeter City

We play another league 1 opponent in a cup match. This one on the road, and on short rest, we play again in 4 days.

GK: Pym (58)
LB: Woodman (59)
CB: Moore-Taylor (60)
CB: Bennett (62)
CB: Tillson (49)
RB: Ribeiro (64)
CM: Davies (59)
CM: Wheeler (59)
CAM: Onyedinma (56)
ST: Hope (64)
ST: Nichols (58)

Nichols up front, normal rotation at attacking mid, Tidser gets his first day off this year for us, Chantler needs a rest, as does Butterfield. I change our mindset to counterattacking for this one. I don't think we're going to have the same luck with a high pressure, free flowing game with this lineup on the road.

2': Wheeler makes a nice tackle and gets us the first attack, we earn a corner as Onyedinma makes a run into the area and has it tackled away, corner goes nowhere.

7': A save from Pym, he kicks it long, Hope gets the ball with three men near him, he is able to avoid one man, get a little space 20 yards out, fires a shot, and its just wide. You can really see the power shot rating though, this is a guy that can score from further away than anyone we have.

7': Yellow for their defender Vincelot for an earlier foul.

16': Great shot from one of their strikers just inside the area as we sit back defending, ugh. 0-1

21': Wheeler wins it for us, a quick pass up to Onydenima, to Hope, Hope hits a through ball for Nichols, he's got a great look, shoots.. saved for a corner. Corner is cleared.

HALF: Lots of back and forth but no serious threats the rest of the half. They have 5 shots to 4, 3 on target to 1, 56/44 possession edge, really about expected on the road vs a better team where we're playing ok, but not great.

Chantler comes in for Woodman for the second half.

49': Good cross in from Chantler, Onyedinma gets to it cleanly but its wide, he's not a great scorer.

66': We've gotten Hope a couple decent looks, not great ones though. Here Ribeiro crosses in and Onyedinma gets a header but wide again.

66': Tidser in for Davies.

90': Added time, Hope earns us a corner as a shot is blocked. Ribeiro takes it, into the 6 yard box, I was aiming near post, went a bit too far with it, an attacker, a defender and the keeper all go up, the defender touches it first, and heads it into his own net!! OWN GOAL! 1-1

FULL TIME: And we have 30 more minutes to play. Holy crap we're tirred. Grimes is in for Wheeler as my last sub, he'll play the more defensive role today. We pushed hard and fairly well in the second half, possession is even (a rarity for me), We outshoot them 12-9, we piled on a lot of pressure. Lets see what we can do in the extra 30 minutes now.

97': Back in the first 10 minutes we noted a defender picking up a yellow. Here we win a ball in defense and clear it out to Onyedinma, he's tackled hard, the ball was missed, its a foul, its another yellow on their defender, he's done! We have a man advantage for the next 23 minutes.

103': Over the next 5 minutes we win two balls in defense and the holes for a counter are just so obvious, but we can't complete the right pass. Here we fail again, as a pass to Nichols is blocked, but we recover, Onyedimna has it, finds Hope rushing into the area unmarked, Hope shoots, GOALL!! 2-1

105': Their man down the left side beats Ribeiro, Tillson rushes over to try to stop him, blocks a cross (great play from my 49 rated scrub), we control the ball when it comes down, out to Chantler. Chantler with a run to about midfield, ahead to Hope, he draws the defense, gets it to Nichols, a man with better skill here could beat his defender and get a 1 on 1 with the keeper. Nichols can't. But we're a man up and there are openings on this counter attack, Nichols spots Onyedinma coming in, passes over to him, shot, and he buries it!!! 3-1

EXTRA TIME HALFTIME: We're already playing ultra-defensive. We'll keep doing that.

We get one corner and a nice headed attempt off it, they get one shot that's blocked behind for a corner, we stop the corner, that's it!

Leyton Orient 1 : 3 Exeter

Goals: Onyedinma (8.6), Hope (7.6)
Assists: Onyedinma, Nichols (8.3)

Wheeler 7.1, Chantler 7.2, Moore-Taylor 7.4, Tidser and Bennett 6.8, Ribeiro 6.7, very solid all around.

It took some luck on taht own goal at the end of regulation, and some more luck to see the horrible foul for the red card, but we did a nice job exploiting that.


We get an extra $3,960 added to the transfer budget for the win. This isn't the tournament we need wins in the most, but they all help. After 120 minutes today, our next game in 4 days is going to be tough.

[Radii]

August 29th, 2015

Exeter City (1-2-1, 13th) vs Dag & Red (1-0-3, 20th)

This is the type of match we have to win reliably if we're going to challenge for promotion.

GK: Pym (58)
LB: Chantler (61)
CB: Moore-Taylor (60)
CB: Bennett (62)
CB: Butterfield (56)
RB: Ribeiro (64)
CM: Tidser (62)
CM: Wheeler (59)
CAM: Grimes (58)
ST: Hope (64)
ST: Harewood (58)

2': We build up immediately after kickoff, Harewood has it a good ways out, spots Ribeiro making a run towards the box, sends the through ball in, Ribeiro has it in the right side of the area, runs towards the end line, lobs the ball towards the center of the area, Hope is there, header.. GOAL! 1-0

What a start!

24': Still 1-0, we had two additional cross attempts that looked solid but couldn't get the head to the ball for the shot, and just had a great look from Harewood but saved. Probably should have scored on this most recent one.

39': We allow a long stretch of passing in our end and can't chase the ball down to win it back, they get a through ball into the right side of the area, it looks like Moore-Taylor stops playing to call for offsides, but its not offsides, they get a 1 on 1 against Pym, Pym comes up huge and stops the shot.

45': Ribeiro does all kinds of work to win the ball for us in our offensive end, a pass to Hope, through ball for Grimes, he shoots... weakly right at the keeper. It was with his weak foot, I guess.

HALF: This is one of those where we might regret not scoring more, we're very clearly the better team in this half. Somehow the stats only say 2 shots to 1, I looked before and it was 2 shots and we saw Grimes shoot at the keeper... bleh. But we did have a lot of attacking buildup that got cleared out, so 3 or 4 shots to 1 might be right. Possession is 54/46 in our favor.

51': They show signs of life to start the second half, here Moore-Taylor makes a tackle outside the area, we can't quite clear it and they get a good shot, it hits the post and goes wide.

55': Cross in from Chantler, Grimes gets his head to it... and it hits the crossbar, damn!

65': A nice run by Chantler helps us earn a corner. Ribeiro takes it, there's a fight for the header, which no one really wins and the ball falls free 8 or 9 yards out, Butterfield is there and he puts in the rebound!! 2-0

71': Nichols in for Hope, Davies in for Wheeler.

82': They get a run down the left, their winger completely jukes Ribeiro to get a free cross, thy win the header, Pym makes a good stop but can't hold it, they have another man there to head the rebound, and Pym can't recover, its a goal. 2-1

88': They are pressing hard and its winning the ball back for them a lot, they're also lobbing non stop long balls over the defense, and I'm afraid of something bad happening here.

88': Onyedinma in for Grimes, I want his speed out there, I tell him to come back for defensive help.

We hang on without serious threat.

Exeter 2 : 1 Dag & Red

Goals: Hope (6.8), Butterfield (6.9)
Assists: Ribeiro (7.5)

Wheeler with a solid 6.7, Bennett 6.6, everyone else struggled a bit, Chantler only a 6.5 out of left back, usualy he controls play so much that he gets a prety solid rating out there. Some of this was the defense though, we did better sending through balls ahead and go down the middle instead of using our fullbacks to push.

We're up to 10th with the win.

[Radii]

-- The tranfer deadline passes without incident, of course for me since i am out of funds. I did turn down an offer of $325,000 for CB Moore-Taylor. We are very very thin at CB, I can't play there. Also, Moore-Taylor is 20 years old with a 60 rating, if we do want to make money from him, we do it by starting him for another year or two and getting $1M+ for him.

-- I also shut down all offers on LB Craig Woodman. The best I could get for him was $170,000 and it woudl leave us with only Chantler at LB, not worth.

-- I get a vote of confidence from the board after a couple wins. I hope that's a good thing, and not the "don't worry everyone" that NFL GM's sometimes issue right before firing a guy. :P

-- There's a positive story in the press about Chantler and how he's quickly becoming a fan favorite.

September 5th, 2015

Stevenage (2-1-2, 14th) vs Exeter City (2-2-1, 10th)

GK: Pym (58)
LB: Chantler (61)
CB: Moore-Taylor (60)
CB: Bennett (62)
CB: Baldwin (60)
RB: Ribeiro (64)
CM: Tidser (62)
CM: Wheeler (60)
CAM: Onyedinma (56)
ST: Hope (64)
ST: Harewood (59)

We see some increases in ratings, Wheeler up to 60, Harewood up to 59, though he's old, is that like a cohesion rating bump or something? He's not listed with high morale or anything.

Baldwin is back from injury at CB, though he still shows with a minor injury risk, I may only play him for a half.

25': Each team has 1 shot, though they look a bit better than we do, we've allowed a couple scary crosses, and really not attacked well ourselves.

32': They are playing very tight defense, we're doing a good job not giving it away in the middle, but struggling to find an opening. We finally spot something though, Tidser with a beautiful through ball for Onyedinma in the area, he's all alone, but can't finish, keeper saves it.

42': A poor clearance by Ribeiro gives them the ball in a scary spot and they earn a corner as Pym makes a save. Corner is taken to the edge of the box, they get a shot through the crowd, Pym goes down to stop it, but the rebound is put in by them. 0-1

45': We push hard after the restart, giving it away but continuing to press. A pass out is intercepted by Wheeler in their half, a quick pass up to Harewood, he hits a through ball into the area for Hope, Hope strikes it, at the keeper, but he can only slow it down, not stop it, and the ball is off the keeper and in! 1-1

45': Poor defending by Chantler allows them one more chance before the half, a cross comes in, they win the header, Pym has to dive, but he catches it and holds it. Good save.

HALF: We generated two great looks and should probably have two goals, but overall they've played better and look more threatening. We are making too many poor plays in defense though and allowing crosses in too easily. If we can shore that up we could be fine.

59': Throwin for us near midfield, after a couple quick passes, Ribeiro spots Harewood with a step on the defense, the pass is clean, Harewood shoots... keeper stops it. Damn! Again!

63': Harewood to Hope, an on target shot with the weak foot for Hope, but its blocked away by the keeper. Out for a throw.

64': Chantler with a cross to the far side after the throwin, Harewood heads it, keeper has to jump to get a fingertip to it, very very close. Corner. Corner is cleared.

65': Davies in for Wheeler.

70': We take a goal kick short, afer one pass though Harewood has it near midfield, he spots Hope up ahead, passes to him, there's one defender back, Hope goes left, cuts back right, generates his own space, shoots from inside the area, and its by the keeper!! 2-1

70': Mindset changed from attack to defend.

78': CM Byrne in for Harewood, back to a Defensive Mid position, 5-4-1 (with a diamond of mids in the center) formation.

84': They get a lob into the area, poor first touch, they still get a shot off it but its wide. That could hae easily been a goal.

That's it, we hold them off!

Stevenage 1 : 2 Exeter

Man of the Match: Harewood (8.6)
Goals: Hope 2 (8.4)
Assists: Harewood 2

7.1 from Ribeiro, everyone else in the 6's. Really good road win! We're up to 6th.

Hope has 4 league goals, league leader has 5. I am not doing anything to specifically try to get him goals or anything, but its very very obvious that he's a much better finisher than anyone else I've had, Armstrong included.

Game winner from Hope: