My LLM game: The story so far…
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Picking a team to manage on Football Manager is possibly one of the hardest decisions a man (or a woman) will make in their life. This is assuming that whoever is reading this isn’t, for example, a brain surgeon, as the liklihood is you will have had to make slightly more important and meaningful judgements. But forgetting about making life or death decisions, choosing a club on Football Manager is still difficult.
After playing the demo of FM2010, I decided I wanted to go down the Lower League Management (LLM) route, as in previous editions, I had been successful in this kind of game; most notably with AFC Wimbledon (2009), Ilkeston Town (2009) and Oxford United (2008). The team I’d be managing in 2010 had to be in either the Blue Square North or South, and I decided that I had to have some kind of indirect affiliation with them. After scouring the two leagues, I decided on Harrogate Town; the reasons being they were only 70 miles away from where I lived in Hull, and their squad (according to their official website) included Matt Bloomer (an ex-Hull City defender), Curtis Woodhouse (another ex-Hull City player-turned-boxer-turned-footballer) and perhaps most alluringly, Trevor Benjamin (a journeyman striker of Leicester City fame).
When October the 30th finally came around though, and I’d waited what seemed like days for the game to install, I chose to manage Harrogate and rather annoyingly, only one of the three players appeared in their squad; Matt Bloomer. Nevertheless, I put that behind me and began to assess my squad. I signed several players, such as Ian Cox, Simon Heslop and Lawrie Dudfield (another ex-Hull City player who I’m especially fond of on Football Manager, not because he’s a particularly outstanding player, but because he lived three doors away from my Grandma whilst he was playing for Hull) but the squad never seemed to gel and unfortunately we were relegated on the last day of the season. Whether the board wanted to sack me or not was irrelevant; the Blue Square North and South were the lowest playable leagues, so therefore I had to go.
After my dismissal, I went on a job-application-binge; applying to each and every manager’s position that came available, even the Brazilian and Argentinian national sides, in the hope that one would accept me, even if it was out of pure pity. Needless to say, I didn’t get the Brazil or Argentina jobs, but even more realistic targets like Staines, Hyde and Dorchester chose to look elsewhere for a manager. Things looked grim for my managerial future; I was so close to retiring and starting again from scratch, but in December 2011, 20 months after being sacked by Harrogate, AFC Telford United approached me to become their new manager, and without much consideration, I accepted their offer.
It’s fair to say that Telford were struggling when I took over; after finishing just outside the play-offs in the 2010/11 season, they found themselves teetering around the relegation zone in 18th place. However, they were surprisingly wealthy for a Blue Square South club, meaning I had quite a bit of money to spend. Six players were signed in the first week of my new job, including Lewis Alessandra, Jake Simpson and the vastly-experienced Graham Coughlan, who I promptly installed as my captain. By the end of February 2012, I had got the club up to 6th in the league, and pushing for a play-off place; a vast improvement on the club’s early-season form. Lewis Alessandra was linking brilliantly with strike partner Ryan Charles, another played I brought in for little money, and the two new wingers, Jake Simpson and Netan Sansara, were coming up with countless assists and some vital goals themselves.
We ended up finishing 4th, therefore getting into the play-offs. Our rise up the league was incredible, and something that I would’ve never predicted when I first took over. We went into the second leg of the play-off semi final against Droylsden on the back of a 1-1 draw in the first leg, and without three key players; Alessandra, Charles and Sansara. However despite fielding a weakened side we won 3-1, with Sansara’s replacement on the left wing, Carl Tremarco, grabbing two goals to ensure our place in the final against Worcester City, who had rather unexpectedly overcome long-time leaders of the pack Hinckley in their semi-final. After 90 goalless minutes, the dreaded penalties were looming. Graham Coughlan had other plans though; in the 114th minute, he got on the end of a Jake Simpson cross and headed in to win us the game. It was like something out of Roy of the Rovers, and it’s fair to say I went pretty mental (in a good way) when he scored. It’s for these kind of moments that I play Football Manager.
We were tipped as promotion contenders at 14-1 before our first season in the Blue Square Premier, largely due to the fact we’d recruited some good talent, including Richard Offiong, Denis Behan and Lewis Montrose. A good season overall left us in 9th place; a very respectable position in our maiden season in the league, even though we’d occupied higher places for the majority of the campaign. Offiong and Behan both impressed all season long, getting 18 and 20 goals respectively, and Ryan Charles also broke the 20-goal barrier for the second season in a row. The unsung hero of the season award definitely went to Lewis Montrose though; at just 24 years old, he basically ran the team from the centre of midfield, contributing 20 assists and achieving a pass completion ratio of 86%.
The 2013/14 season was an altogether similar affair, but we finished two places higher than the previous year, ending in 7th place. The board were pleased with another good season, but part of me couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed at the thought of yet another season being one step away from league football. The transfer market was very slow before the start of the 2014/15 season, but a good start left us in 2nd at the end of September; setting up what could be a very successful season, and hopefully our last in the Blue Square Premier.
A month-by-month blog of my exploits with AFC Telford United can be found here.
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Your game sounds really similar to my Blyth game, except it doesn’t sound like you’re bankrupt.
The best thing I think about this story is the persistence that you should I think that too many people can give up too easily and I think the best way to learn this game, even you get the sack is to keep the game open and move to another club, and so on until you find out what is the best thing to do in the game etc…
Its good to hear about your story here at FM View, it would be good to see from you other things as well.