West Ham United a CM0102 Dynasty

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A brief history

West Ham United formed in 1895 as Thames Ironworks FC later changed to their current name in 1900.

West ham play in a claret and blue home kit and currently a white away kit.

Their highest league placing is 3rd in the 1985-86 season in the old first division before it became the Premier League, in the Premier League it is 5th during the 1998-99 season.

Cup Success:

F.A Cup 3 wins in 1964,1975 and 1980, most recently they finnished runners up in 2006 to Liverpool.

UEFA Cup Winners Cup 1 win in 1965 and runners up in 75.

UEFA Inter-Toto Cup 1 win in 1999.

Stadium:

The Boleyn Ground, Upton Park, Capacity 35,640



Last Seasons Finnish: 17th

Notes: I am using CM 01/02 with Feb2011 update, all dates will be displayed from 01/02 season onwards but playes are accurate as of feb 2011

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Pre-Season Overview

The Board exectations for this season are to avoid relegation, I feel this should be easy to achieve but will examine my situation before setting my own goals.

The Senior Squad:


3 Things here:

1) We are overloaded in the forward third by quite a bit, some of these players however are not yet ready to play 1st team (Sears) or are just fat has been overpaid wastes of space(McCarthy), the good news is that this should alleviate itself after the season with both Obinna and Keane on loan and hopefully McCarthy moved on to pastures new.

2) We need a backup Goalkeeper, Green is a Solid 1st team GK but Boffin and the reserve GKs are not up to much at all.

3) The defence looks fairly decent, Upson is a solid 1st choice centre Half but come the end of season i will need to look for a new set of Full Backs and probably a young Centre Half to replace Gabbidon.

Overall im happy enough with the Squad, lots of options up front and the midfield picks itself with Parker the rock in the centre, some players will move on hopefullly to help me bring ina bit more variety in midfield eventually.

Players out of contract at end of Season

Gabbidon - an ageing DC, has his uses will see how he performs before deciding if i want to keep him.

Green - My number 1 GK, must keep him at all costs, losing him for nothing would be a disaster especially as i would then have to get 2 new GKs.

Jacobsen - Average right back, could probably be replaced easily, might offer him a 1 year deal depending on performance.

Spector - A fairly young decent utility player, i will offer him a deal on the same terms and see what happens.

Upson - My number 1 DC getting on at 31 but still has a good few years left, I will offer him an extension but if he asks for much more money he can leave.

Dyer - Injury prone and old, decent enough player but unless he takes a pay cut from his £55k a week he can leave.

The Reserves


Hitzelsperger is out for 3 months and Collison is out for 7 months, both will be in the 1st team when they recover, both backup GKs are poor as well. the rest are mostly young kids who may or mate not progress, aprt from a few notables:

Boa Morte - a 32 year old avergae attacking midfielder, will probably play a part in 1st team and will be let go when his contract expires at the end of next season.

Faubert - i want him out £22.5k pw for a bloke who adds nothing anywhere on the pitch, i have transfer listed him.

Players for the Future!

Zavon Hines - a quick striker 21 years old, will get limited playing time this year unless he does something special, definitely one to watch!

Junior Stanislas - a tricky winger who at 20 is progressing nicely, might get some playing time in the cups.

Paul McCallum - a promising striker at 16, definitely one to keep tabs on.

Dominic Vose - 16, has the potential to be the next joe cole, determined personality will set him well.

Jordan Spence - at 19 he will need to start pushing ahead in terms of performance to make an impression but he shows some promise.

The Formation


With the players i have my best bet is a 4-3-3, this will allow my quick strikers to play off a central target man and drop back to defend when needed, this should be defensively sound untill a team overloads midfield, hopefully the return of Hitzlesperger will aid in this scenario as with both him and parker putting themselves about it should be enough to keep most teams from overloading us.

The opening 5 fixtures for the Premier League are as follows:

Bolton Away
Everton Home
Arsenal Away
Sunderland Home
Newcastle Away

A fairly tough opening as it doesnt contain any teams i would consider relegation candidates, i would say 8 or 9 points from those to be the standard im aiming for.

Finances

West ham have £11.5 million in the bank with around £4 Million to spend on transfers, with just over half a million going out a week on wages alone i will need to finnish in the Premier league this season or face very harsh financial troubles next season.

Goals for the season

1. I want to finnish mid table, far from any relegation battle.
2. Put up a good showing in the cups, looking to get at least a quarter final in one of them, preferably the F.A Cup.
3. Reduce the Wage Bill.
4. Bring in some new backroom Staff
5. Bring in a backup GK and some new full backs.

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I have offered Juventus, Charlton Cagliari and margate friendly proposals. This should give me a fairly balanced pre season to see how my team stacks up against teams of various quality.

I have also offered coaching and physio jobs to a few people. while also assigning training regimes to the squad, my backroom staff were not up to my high standards and i also needed to employ an Assistant manager.

My next job was to scout the free agency for any bargains, there are a fair few to be had that are good enough and i ultimately end up going for 11 different players, including Cesear a Quality centre back who would slot in next to upson perfectly.
Searched for free players:

Unfortunately Juve decline my friendly proposal but everyone else accepts, a shame as i would have liked to see how my players coped playing a top side.

West ham welcome Bryan pop robson and richard Evans as new coach and physio respectively

My 1st Pre season game at Bradford
Bradford 1 West ham 5
An easy result, nothing to be gained really as players getting fitness, Obinna with man of the match with 3 assists and a goal, Ba and Cole both score a brace.


West Hame welcome coachs Neil Bailey and Thomas Brunner, and our first player signs, free transfer Mehdi Nafti

8k a week until 2004, a decent enough option in midfield on cheap wages.

Backup Goalie also signs, west ham fans will remember Roy carroll a former servant to the club and ex manchester united player.

£6,750 a week untill 05, very happy with this signing.

We also welcome Bobby Downes as my Assistant Manager

2nd Pre Season game at Upton Park
A comfortable enough game with us 5 - 1 up at half time, after using all my subs at half time the game finnishes a slightly dissapointing 6 - 3 with goals from Noble (2) Obinna, Gabbidon, Keane and Cole.

3rd pre season away to Cagliari.
An easy 5 - 1 victory, with Noble scoring 2 and Parker, Cole and Ba getting the rest. Boa Morte was injured and will be out for 10 days.

New Transfer system outlined, this basically gives players even more power, unless you lock players down in long contracts before this switch you can only offer a 5 year deal maximum and the players can opt out after 3 years if under the age of 28 or 2 years if over that. Also more compensation is given to clubs if they bring a young prospect through the ranks who is ultimately stolen by bigger clubs, this is about the only good thing from the change in rules.

Final Pre Season Game at home to Margate,
Decided to play roughly my starting 11 and keep them going most of the match, the result a comfortable 3 - 0, 2 Goals for Ba and a goal for Obinna.

My Starters


Green - My best goalkeeper an easy decision.

Bridge - The best left back at the club

Upson - The best central defender at the club

Gabbidon - A tough choice as none of my other centre backs are all that
good, Gabbidon is the best of the bunch however his stamina may cause me issues, for the moment he starts.

Jacobsen - No real competition for his spot, had a good pre season but if his performances drop during the season the only real backup is Spector.

Spector - A big decision to play him as a starting midfielder, with Hitzlesperger and Collison out injured this spot has been up for grabs, Boa Morte had claimed it but with his injury Spector will have to step up and make it his own.

Noble - A great player and again this is an easy decision.

Parker (captain) - Same as Noble one of the 1st names on the team sheet.

Obinna - Had a cracking pre season but unfortunately he has no competition for his starting place.

Keane - Not too impressive pre season, he may lose his starting berth to Barrera if he doesn't improve.

Ba - Although both he and Cole had a fantastic pre seasons, Ba wins out for now, but he will need to keep scoring goals or Cole will step in.

With the pre season over we can start to look forward to the season opener at Bolton, a team west ham had traditionally struggled to beat, Kevin Davies has a habbit of ALWAYS scoring against us and i intend to put that right.

Also with Everton having european commitments our home game against them is moved which means we dont play at home untill the 3rd game of the season, out 1st two fixterues Bolton Away and Arsenal Away will be a good test of where my team stacks up.

Note: from now on each post will = 1 game month. Also if you want to see a screenshot of anything in game feel free to ask.

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August

I have high hopes for my 1st ga,e against Bolton, although it will be a tough game it will give me a clue as to where my team is in terms of competitive edge, a good start is vital.

We lose 3 - 1



Where to even begin, 3 - 0 down at half time with Robert Green playing poorly, we created more chances than them at least but it does you no good if you cant score, I begin the 2nd half hoping to salvage a draw but am forced to make a change when Wayne Bridge goes off injured (3 Weeks) and Keane injured shortly after that (3 Months!). We press hard and pull one back but cant find another goal, then to compound the4 faith i put in him SPECTOR gets sent off. This caps a miserable game for me.

Positives:
Ba scored on his debut.
We had 14 shots.
Kevin Davies didnt score against us.

Negatives:
2 injurys 1 fairly substantial.
Poor GK performance.
only 5 of our 14 shots was on target.
Spector banned for 3 matches.

The Aftermath
I complained about the Referee to the FA who agreed he was poor, aparantly Bolton didnt foul a single player of our all game!
Robert Green was warned about his perfomance, he agreed with me and said he will try to improve. Lets move on and to the easier game against Arsenal (yeah right)...i hate Bolton.

LEAGUE CUP DRAW
West ham will play Oldham Athletic in the 2nd round of the league cup at upton park, sept 19th, i shall be sending out a weakened side if possible.

Arsenal V West Ham
Pre game starts out well with Gabbidon picking up an injury making two changes to an already terrible defence, i fear for my team right now, still SPECTOR can still play in this game and with Super Johnny SPECOTR in the side, miricles can happen. Illunga comes in to replace the injured Bridge with Da Costa replacing Gabbidon, also Barrera slots in for the injured Keane, Optimism is running high, we can beat this Arsenal team!

We lose 1 - 0



We held them at bay for an hour but eventually their class told, no injuries or sendings off at least, Robert Green got an 8 rating which was nice to see after last match. I still feel we didnt play as well as we could however. With that game ends this months fixtures, bitter dissapointment really and some squad selection problems to boot, I will have to put this behind me and move on to next month which invloves us playing 6 games!
Onwards and upwards!

Position in the table: 20th
Goals Scored: 1
Goals Conceeded: 4

Top Scorer(s)
Ba - 1

Yellow Cards
Mathew Upson - 1
Scott Parker - 1
Manuel Da Costa - 1

Red Cards
Spector - 1

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September

Sunderland
Our 1st home game of the season, Spector replaced with Boa Morte, no other changes, a tough game in the offing but i am confident my team can pull out a result. Scott Parker took this game by the scruff of the neck and drove a resurgent west ham to a 5 - 1 thrashing scoring a goal and setting one up on his way to the man of the match accolade. Demba Ba and Pablo Barrera scoring 2 each. This result moves us up to 14th!

Newcastle at St James Park
A tough game, west ham welcome back Alan Pardew who hammers fans will always remember for that FA cup final!

West ham romped to a 3 - 1 win, Robert Green put in a man of the match display in goal keeping Newcastle out and allowing west ham to go 3 up before finally letting one in. Ba, Obinna and Cole all got a goal, Cole score the same minute he came on as a sub!

Injury Update!
Danny Gabbidon who returned to training has injured his knee, he will be out for a further 3 weeks.

Wolves at Home
This should be an easy 3 pointer.

Disaster strikes in on the 37 minute mark with robert green indicating he cannot continue, he sustained a thigh injury we shall have to wait and see how long he is out for! A 4 - 0 win makes this a comfortable afternoon, Bareera,Ba,Parker and Obinna each notch a goal for 3 wins in 3 this month and our first clean sheet of the season! We dominated this game from start to finnish allowing only 2 off target shots to Wolves. This result takes us up to 2nd!!!

Injury Update!
Robert Green's injury isnt as bad as we feared and he will be out for around 10 days.

Oldham Athletic, League Cup second Round HOME
I will be putting out a weakened team in this game, mainly to give my 1st team a rest, and try out some of the promising yougsters, not too fussed about this competition.

A very easy game, everyone played well, Dyer got man of the match with 3 assists, cole scored two and Sears and Hines my two young starlets both scored in a 4 - 0 victory.

Blackpool away.
I will be expecting 3 points from this one.

It was a very hard fought 2 - 1 win for the hammers, Scot Parker and Carlton Cole scoring, bad news is my top scorer Ba is injured and out for 3 weeks!!

West Ham will play Blackburn Rovers away in the league cup 3rd round.

West Ham V Manchester United
This will be a guide to how far we have actually come this month, if we win it is a clean sweep with 6 wins out of 6, and with Chelsea Away as the 1st game next month we could be looking at 2 losses on the bounce, i just hope to give them a game.

With it being 0 - 0 at half time things looked good, and when Boa Morte scored in the 52nd minute i was hopeful for a result of some kind, but their quality shone through and they eventually equalized with Rooney scoring 8 minutes later and Valencia dealing the killing blow in th 74th minute, dissapointing but we gave a good account of ourselves.

Overall a fantastic month, up to 4th in the table and through in the cup, apart from chelsea next game October should bring more points with a good few winnable games.


Stats for the month:

Position in the table: 4th
Goals Scored: 19
Goals Conceeded: 5

Season:

Top Scorer(s)
Ba - 5
Cole - 4 (2 Cup)
Barrera - 3
Parker - 3
Obinna - 2
Sears - 1 (1 Cup)
Hines - 1 (1 Cup)
Boa Morte - 1

Yellow Cards
Scott Parker - 2
Manuel Da Costa - 2
Mathew Upson - 1
Herita Illunga - 1
Pablo Barrera - 1

Red Cards
Spector - 1