retired_manragh

Fulham Continued

Tuesday the 4th July

I slept pretty well surprisingly, considering the nerves I still possessed, but sleeping had never been a real problem, when patrolling you often had to find sleep anytime you could, so I guess it my training had paid off. I was picked up from my apartment and driven to my office at Craven College, normally according to the driver it takes only 15 to 20 minutes to get there, but today with the traffic it took closer to 40 minutes, I could of almost ran there in that time.

My office is pretty impressive I have to say, well it impresses me, but I may be easily impressed, a big beautiful wooden desk is the main attraction for me , on it a matching in/out paper tray made of the same material as the desk with a black phone sitting next to that, behind the desk and against the wall was another desk, this one looked more like a wall unit with its cupboards and drawers, on it was a computer. Sitting back in my leather chair I couldn’t help but smile, but now it was time to do some work.

I logged into the computer and went into the job market that I had been shown before and began searching for a defence coach, after adding in the parameters I was looking for only one name came up, Simon Morgan, a 39 year old coach and he happened to be available. I started to read into his background and I couldn’t believe my luck, a former Fulham captain through the rough times, and a fan favourite back in the days, he finished up here in the 00/01 season and went a played a year at Brighton, he then had a year stint as a youth coach and then left the club once again. I went through and found the contact number for his agent and made the call, after quickly bandying around some details we came to an agreement, 300 per week for 3 years and he would be in charge of the defensive outfit, his agent would propose the deal to his client and get back to me.

Next it was time to go through the First team squad, I was just waiting on Steve Kean to arrive with who was in the first team at the moment and then we would be going over that, speak of the devil here he was now. I informed him I had found a defensive coach and was just awaiting on the deal to be finalised, he was pleased to learn it was Simon Morgan, a great bloke and it will be well received by the fans he told me.

Time to go through the squad

Goalkeepers

Jan Lastuvka –Talented up and coming GK, the 23y.o Czech will provide good back up this year.
Antti Niemi –Skillful and Masterful keeper, highly respected amongst his peers, definite starter in the first team.

Defenders

Phillipe Christanval –good in the air, makes good decisions and a hard worker, needs to be injury free, solid centre back.
Liam Rosenior -Up and coming right back and in fierce competition for the starting spot with Volz, needs game time to develop more
Carlos Bocanegra –Versatile defender who can cover on the left as well as in the centre, makes the odd bad decision, but good value.
Ian Pearce –Getting slower in his old age and probably play a lot of reserves football this year, good backup if needed.
Moritz Volz –Hard working right back who makes intelligent runs forward, in competition with Liam for the starting spot, probably just shades him.
Frank Queudrue –Good acquisition and looks great so far on the track, similar to Volz but not quite as hard working, plays left back.

Defensive Midfielders

Papa Bouba Diop volatile midfielder and a great talent on the pitch, works hard and is arguably the best player in the side, he knows it as well and can be a handful some times.
Simon Elliot Similar to Papa just a little slower and more down to earth, unfortunately sidelined for four months with that calf injury.
Alexey Smertin Similar to the other two defensive midfielders, works hard and has plenty of experience, both club and internationally.

Midfield

Michael Brown hard working midfielder who can run all day, good technically and if he can string some games together should be better for the run, needs to start showing his talent.
Jimmy Bullard An exceptional player with great passing range and vision and will be a key figure in our fortunes this year.
Simon Davies The 26y.o Welsh International will provide some more depth to the midfield, another hard worker who runs the lines well.
Clint Dempsey The young American brings some much needed pace and flair to the squad, will be interesting to see how he develops.
Wayne Routledge Part of the deal that seen Steed go to Tottenham sees Wayne come to Fulham for a year, lightning quick with decent technical skills should see him get a few games this year.
Tomasz Radzinski The 32 year old Canadian still possesses great pace and excellent technique, will probably pay more a part if injuries take a toll.
Robert Milsom Young upcoming attacking left winger, shows good promise, but will be mainly reserves this year, might pay to give him some first team experience at a lower division.
Claus Jenson Wonderful skilful player on the ball who works hard and has great creativity should be given plenty of opportunities this year as its one thing we do lack.

Forwards
Collins John A highly rated youngster that has all the qualities needed to succeed at this level, just needs to work on positioning and putting away the chances he gets.
Brian McBride A hard working strong forward, he doesn’t score a lot of goals of but is involved in the make up of a lot of them.
Vincenzo Montella Looks like a good player, deadly in front of goal and quick and agile unfortunately out for two months with a dislocated shoulder.

That’s the basis of what we have this year, I haven’t gone through fully the reserve squad as yet but there is quality down there with new signing Björn Runström and Mark Pembridge both there at the moment although Mark is out injured for a few months.

After our meeting it was time to meet the players and it’s a little different looking at 51 names on paper and then looking them in the eye, it’s a bit daunting really to have their futures in my hands, although being in the military teaches you a fair bit about leadership.

I gave my little speech about everyone pulling together as one and if we can do that then we should overcome a lot of obstacles this year, I wanted to put a lot more emphasis on winning away, if we can do that and maintain our home form than we can be top 10 this year and that should be something we aim for. If they train hard then they will all be given a chance and the friendly games and training are going to have a big influence on who starts during the first stage of the year, as far as tactics go we will be looking to keep a basic 442 lineup although that will depend on who and where we play, We will probably play around 3-6 varying tactics this year, so its something we need to work on.

After saying varying the tactics a bit I noticed a few players looking at each other and shrugging, even some of the coaching staff looked baffled which had me confused, I would have to ask Steve about that, I asked if anyone had questions but they were all pretty quite so I dismissed them and they went out to train.

I didn’t really know much about training the team so I left it to Steve and Billy to sort out what they were going to do with the respective squads, I had to a meeting with Mr Fayed and the board.

The meeting with Mohammed and the board went pretty well, he gave me an outline of what we needed to do this year and that was avoid relegation at all costs, himself the board with consoltation with Steve Kean had already signed and released some players this year and at this stage I had around 35,000 pounds leeway in my wage budget and they were also going to give me 3 and half million in transfer funds incase I knew of a few players that could be brought in. I was also made aware that any transfers had to be okayed by the board and they expected to be consulted on all major decisions this year, considering finances which I thought was fair enough, Stuart Benson would be my liaison for this.

I informed them I had already offered a contract to Simon Morgan as a defensive coach this year and gave them the details, the board were pleased with this move and said there was even room for one more coach if needed it, they then told me that I would probably need another two scouts to help out with scouting, but that was a decision that I needed to make, all they were going to do was recommend things for me to decide on..

The meeting didn’t take to long and I caught the end of training, which was just some light skill work for the senior squad, and some run throughs for the reserves, I went out to tell Steve if he could come to my office after training would could go over tactics for the upcoming season, he nodded his acceptance and then proceeded to yell at Ian Pearce for making a basic mistake which followed into a threat to the whole squad if they didn’t pick it up a notch they would be out here for another half hour, I liked the mans style.

retired_manragh

Tactics

Someone else must of made a few mistakes because it was around 40 minutes before Steve made his way into my office.

“Thanks for coming, I wanted to discuss a few tactical plans I had for this season, but I noticed before there were a few blank stares when I said I wanted to use in between 3-6 different formations, what do you think about that?” I asked

Steve took time to consider my question “It depends what you mean, if you mean 3-6 completely different formations it will never work, it might work at schoolboy level, where teams haven’t gelled together that well, but at this level, its too hard to implement well and if we don’t get it right then teams will smash us, if you mean have a base formation with a few minor differences then that’s fine” I’d never thought of it that way and it shows my naivety I suppose, but I covered myself by scoffing and saying that I meant having a base formation with a few changes depending on the team.

We spent a few hours going possible formations and we agreed a base 442 formation was probably ideal, with a 451 twist variant as a backup, a 532 formation was discussed at length as we don’t have real quality wingmen, but I don’t want to go that defensive and as Steve explained we didn’t have the required quality at the centre back positions to pull that off anyway. One of the formations that we did agree on was 4 at the back with a defensive midfielder in front of them and then playing three central midfielders with 2 up front, it severely cut down our width though which might be a problem, so we came up with a modified central midfield position, the left and right centre midfielders would move into left and right midfield spots with the full backs overlapping, it was something that might work as we had a very hardworking squad so that wouldn’t be an issue, what we did need to do was to increase the core fitness of the group to sustain an effort over 90 minutes. A variation of this would to be drop one of the forwards into an attacking midfield role which would provide more impact in the middle and then have the left and right central midfielder making diagonal runs to the wings. We decided to bring it in slowly, hopefully by the end of the friendly games we would have it all worked out but for now we would stick with a standard 442 formation and just implement the new tactic slowly over the next few weeks

It was going to take a lot of work to implement but I think I earned some respect from Steve in the process with my knowledge of tactics and what other teams used and ways to combat certain tactics and also hammering out a new formation that might work, and I certainly learned a few things as well.

Steve was adamant that we needed another centre back, particularly someone with a bit of pace, good marking, and a great technical tackler, so we looked up to see if anyone was available on the market, unfortunately there was no one of any note, just a lot of younger players, who weren’t any better than what we had now.

“I can get Jake Wales to look into it for us”
“The new scout” replied Steve, “I really have my doubts about him, I don’t think he’s much chop from what I gathered so far”

“How so?” I enquired

“Well we were talking and he doesn’t seem to recognise talent well, take for instance, Milsom, sure he has some talent, but I wouldn’t rate him a brilliant prospect just yet, but Wales seem to think he was the best thing since sliced bread, that’s just one of a few examples”

“So what do you recommend?”

“Let him scout the lower leagues, maybe he will get lucky, but hire a couple decent scouts, were going to need one for scouting opponents and at least another to check out talent”

“Sounds feasible, let’s look who’s on the job market now, and see if you know anyone?”

Once again we were on the computer, now looking for a few decent scouts, we went through a long list of names and Steve recognised one Billy Arbuckle was a few years older than Steve but was highly respected in Scotland for finding talent, he also wasn’t a slouch when scouting teams either. I picked up the phone and got in touch with Stuart Benson my liaison and enquired about getting in some new scouts, he told me it was fine to hire who ever I felt like but don’t go over 425 pounds a week and nothing longer than three years, and try and keep it to no more than 4 scouts, although if we had a specific purpose we could squeeze it out to six.

“Do you want to ring him then, being a fellow countryman and all” I asked Steve

“Sure” he replied and he was on the phone negotiating with the guidelines I had been given, eventually we put it on speaker phone so we could both talk to the man and we found a deal that was amicable between both parties, he asked for a few days to think it over.

“Know anyone else?”

“Actually I do, he’s down at Oxford in the conference and is one of the reasons we have a friendly with them, he’s an old bugger, but funny, use to be a manager but now prefers the less stressful life, make a good opposition scout actually”

“Name?”

“Bobby Roberts, use to manage Grimsby a while back, Ill find his number and give him a ring later”

“Excellent, same parameters as the last though ok” Steve nodded “Anything else you think we need?”

“Na, I think that’s it for now, I’ll keep my ear out for any defenders that might be willing to cross over, until we get a reply from these scouts”

“Sounds good”

And with that we concluded the meeting

retired_manragh

Training, 5th July

I went to both senior and reserve training sessions today and basically watched proceedings while bowing to Steve and Billy’s expertise in the area, after the group sessions they were divided into the respective groups of defenders, midfielders etc and worked on those areas with the respective coaches, I did take over in the tactical training areas where I apologised for my miscommunication earlier and told them about the new tactics we were going to try and employ, I managed to get the general point of the tactics across and what we were trying to achieve and what we were trying to stop and I think it went over quite well, we would work on it more tomorrow after the fitness sessions by going through positional training for specific situations, but after that we were off to Scotland on the 7th as we had the friendly against Aberdeen on the 8th.

Talking to Billy McKinlay at the reserve training I was trying to ascertain if we had any good prospects coming through in that department, a lot of them were young and fresh out of the under 18 competition but he said Chris James, Sam Warrel looking promising types in the midfield while Ehui had some talent up front, out of the established players he said Ahmad Elrich the Australia international was good value, while Tony Warner was an excellent back up keeper, on his recommendation I moved both Björn Runström and Heidar Helguson to the first team. I also asked him if he could travel up to Watford to take a look at a couple youngsters Adrian Mariappa and Lloyd Doyley were two likely defenders that would fit in Steve Keans mould of quality defenders. I asked Ray Lewington to go out west to Swindon to take a look at Jeremy Ifil for me aswell.

6th July

With both Ray and Billy away scouting out prospective players I took a more active role in training although in truth I didn’t have to much to do, but I feel the more I'm out there with the players the better understanding and bond I can get, I’ve even started to join in with the fitness training, I'm a little rusty but not to bad considering I spent along time in the hospital doing nothing.

Billy came to see me late in the afternoon and said that both Watford players looked pretty good, both had speed and agility and looked good technically, during some competitive work they looked like they had the skills and attitude to mark well but its not something he could tell without watching them play a few games.

Ray Lewington had similar story to tell, Ifil was a decent looking sort who possessed good pace and had decent technical ability but it would pay to get a scout to look take a closer look.

I talked to Steve about and he agreed, we needed to get some scouts to take a better look at them although he had heard good things about Mariappa he was basically untried at senior level, Lloyd Doyley on the other hand had been a vital part of Watford’s defence although he was employed more at right back and that’s a spot we had covered at the moment.

Also in the news was that League One side Swansea had appointed Norwich assistant manager Doug Livermore as their new boss.

I got two very pleasing phone calls late in the evening, one was from Simon Morgan, he wanted to discuss a few things like my plans for the club, and what exactly his role was to be, after speaking to him for 10 minutes he agreed to become the defensive coach, I told him to pack his bags as he would be coming to Scotland with the team, the other was from Billy Arbuckle, he had thought over the deal and had agreed all there was to do was to sign the contract officially.

7th of July

Friday was not a good for day for us as both Volz and Lastuvka injured themselves in the morning running session, Volz rolled his ankle and had a nasty sprain that would see him sitting out the rest of July, while Lastuvka strained his hami and needed scans, Jason Palmer informed anywhere from 2-4 weeks for him, it meant Tony Warner was coming on the plane for the the Aberdeen game tomorrow.

Both Simon Morgan and Billy Arbuckle signed contracts before we headed out and Billy was given his first assignment, Steve had learned that young Boro defender David Wheater had come up on the transfer market as being available to loan, so Billy Arbuckle was to scout him, Steve also informed me that Bobby Roberts was a no go, he was happy at Oxford at the moment, it meant we had to find someone else. I rang Stuart before we left for Scotland and asked him to put out the word we were looking for two scouts.

retired_manragh

First game in charge

Saturday the 8th July

It was an exciting prospect coaching my first ever game and I was up pretty early going over things with Steve at breakfast, while eating I received a phone call from a reporter from football365.com asking whether there was any truth to the rumours that Papa Diop would be moving to Marseille in the near future as both him and his agent confirmed they would be interested in a move to the French Giants. Well I almost coughed my Museli over Steve when I heard the news, I asked for a second to recover and asked Steve in a whisper if he new of anything, his reply was forboding “Welcome to Fulham and the ongoing saga of the Diop transfer rumours, just tell them no” he smiled.

“I have no intention of letting Papa leave the club at the moment, I’ve been in charge 5 days and at this time all the players in the first squad are required players, so the answer is a resounding no, I hope that clears things up” was my official reply.

That phone call help finalise our starting lineup for the day, with predictions of dry hot day around the mid 30’s most players would only see a half at most anyway, but with Diop and his agents statements he would starting on the bench. The starting line up looked like this
(GK)Niemi, (DR) Rosenior, (DL) Queudrue, (DC)Knight and Christanval, (MR)Routledge, (ML)Dempsey, (MC)Smertin and Bullard, (FC) John and McBride. Joining Diop on the bench was Warner, Bocanegro, Omazusi(u18), Pearce, Brown, Davies, Radzinski, Jenson, Helguson, Runström and Murtagh(u18).

It was pretty bloody hot at kick off, 35 degrees the official temp, the only good thing about it was I could use the excuse of the heat to cover my mass sweating from nerves.
I was pretty calm before hand as I delivered my first pre match speech just telling the players to go out and enjoy the game and task some risks and show me what they can do, but now at kick off I was pretty fidgety.

Aberdeen got the game underway and as expected the ball was just passed around for a few minutes, thankfully my nerves were settled pretty early when Smertin cut off a pass in the 6th minute and played it off to Bullard, his vision and range of passing was part of the reason he was brought to the club and he showed he indeed was worthy of the comments with a brilliant through ball to Routledge who was streaming down the right wing, a good early swinging cross brought the keeper out but he could only parry it and the rebound fell to John who had slipped his marker, he tapped the goal in under no pressure and we took the 1-0 lead.

We had a couple more good forays forward and McBride forced a good save from their keeper, but if I thought this managing caper was going to be easy I was rudely mistaken, Rosenior committed a professional on 14 minutes and the ref didn’t hesitate and gave an instant red, it was the failure of the centre backs to close down the ball that caused the foul, but this early in the piece I would of thought Rosenior would of made a better judgement call. An early shuffle seen Routledge come back to right back and we narrowed the midfield by bringing in Dempsey to a more central role, not an ideal situation. The resulting free kick took a deflection of the wall and went out for a corner in which Niemi cleanly gathered.

Frank Queudrue looked good at left back and created a couple chances with Smertin having a half chance on his weaker left foot and then McBride missing a good chance a few minutes later.

The last 15 minutes of the half seen Aberdeen step up the tempo against our 10 men, but the defence gelled together well and they didn’t have anything better than a half chance.

We had an extended half time break as both my counterpart Jimmy Calderwood and I agreed to have an extra 5 minutes because of the heat, I didn’t have to much to say to the team except keep it tight and don’t overcommit to our attacking moves, I only made 2 changes at the half despite the heat Runström on for Collins John who hadn’t done a lot since his 6th minute goal and Diop came on for Smertin.

Aberdeen also made two changes at the break but made a noticeable increase in their intensity, and it paid off when Steve Lovell danced around make shift right back Routledge and centred the ball for an unmarked Mackie to smash past Niemi, Christanval lax in his marking on the near post also to blame and Aberdeen were 1-1 after 50 minutes. From the restart we passed it back and a lazy pass by Bullard allowed Lovell to come in pinch the ball and rush past a flat footed defence, with only Niemi to beat he fired of a low hard shot to the right from 12 or so yards out, Niemi did get a hand to it but it wasn’t enough and Aberdeen scored their 2nd in a minute to take 2-1 lead.

I made 6 substitutions and urged the players going on to take a few risks now and see if we could get it back on level terms, Helguson and Radzinski provided some spark and both men came close.

Some good pressure in the 84th minute produced the equaliser for us, an early cross from the right was floated in by Radzinski and Diop was there to head it back across the face of goals in to top right corner.

Runström had a chance to pinch the win in the 92 minute but his shot sailed just wide and as a result we took a pleasing 2-2 draw from the game, pleasing in the fact that we managed to square it up with 10 men but we definitely had a bit of work to do in defence, hopefully Simon Morgan could improve a few things there for us.

The stats were pretty pleasing for us 8 shots with three on target, we had 53% of the possession, 71% completion on the passes, while winning 82% of headers and 76% tackle completion signalled good things. Diop, Queudrue and Radzinski played well for us, but it was young Omozusi who was the most impressive for us when he replaced Routledge at right back.

With the game out of the way the players were allowed to do their own thing that night, while me and Steve and the rest of the staff who made the trip went over the game in more detail, It was mutual consensus that the defence needed some work and Simon had a few ideas to try in the coming weeks so we would see how that panned out, other than that there isn’t to much more you can assess when you only have 10 on the field for the majority of the game.

Billey Arbuckle also rang me later on in the night he had gone and seen young Wheater play in Boro Reserves 4-0 win over Blythe, he looked a pretty good young player and tackled well in the game but he had a bit to learn and would be a better purchase than a loan prospect, he showed good potential but it wasn’t going develop enough in a loan spell over a year to warrant him coming here, Christanval and Bocanegra were probably just as good at this stage in their careers.

Thankfully the Sunday was a bit cooler and we did a light recovery session in one of the local grounds, everyone had pulled up pretty well and Palms was happy to give everyone a full bill of health, Stu Benson rang me in the afternoon before we travelled back to London and said Keith Curle at Torquay was interested in loaning young striker Ismael Ehui for 6 months, after a quick chat with Steve, I said I had no problem with that so aslong as Ismael was keen to go there I was fine with loan.

Monday the 10th July

Looks like Diop was at it again and there was an article on the net at Football365.com that had my comments followed by Diop saying that he owed it to himself to look at moving to a bigger club, and would definitely be interested in a move to Marseille, the lure of playing at such a well established club would be hard to pass down, talking to Steve at training he just said ignore it now until there was an actual offer on the table, it seemed like good advice.

Morgs put the team through some intense training in a 2 hour defensive session, in which I was the only casualty, I ran into young Omozusi and took a slight knock to the calf, it was a good excuse to get back to the office and sort out some paper work that Stu wanted me to go over a sign, one of the things being Ehui loan papers, he had agreed to the 200 mile move to the south west coast.

The next day seen us fly out to Serbia in preparation for our 3 friendlies there, breaking news in England that day was young Boro left winger Stuart Downing had gone to Aston Villa for around 12 million pounds, the only club news we had was that Billy Arbuckle was returning to his native Scotland for a month or so in search for a ready made central defender, he had taken a look at the Watford pair that McKinlay had seen and agreed that both players were more suited to a right back role

retired_manragh

Serbia

We left for Serbia on the Tuesday the 11th travelling with one of our official sponsors AA (American Airlines), my first time in an aircraft of this quality was a pleasant surprise, it was a lot smoother ride than any of previous flights and I didn’t even have to parachute out!
I had researched into the area, it was still recovering from a war and civil strife from many years ago and some of the images reminded me of my time especially the buildings in ruins.

8 days in Serbia and we had 3 games with our last game being against the better team in FK Patrizan, the team was considered to be in the top 3 in the country so it was important to have a good understanding by that time, the other thing we needed to do was rotate the players to prevent fatigue.

We took on Radnicki on Thursday and I was pleased that the conditions were a little better than the extreme heat we played in at Scotland, 25 degrees is a lot more conducive to playing better football than 35 and I'm sure the players will be better of for it, we made 2 changes to the starting line up with Diop and Brown replacing Smertin and Bullard in midfield and it payed off within the first 20 seconds of the match, from the kick off the ball found Diop who pinpointed a lob to McBride, some great skill and strength seen him get a clear on shot on goal which beat the keeper but rebounded back across goals from hitting the inside of the post, Collins John once again the beneficiary of an open goal made no mistake, 17 seconds was the official time from the kick off.

We really put the pedal down and should have been atleast 2 ahead with 10 on the clock, but Dempsey let himself down with some poor finishing, a magnificent run up the left channel and then cutting back in on defenders left him with a good chance but he blazed it over the top, and then 2 minutes later he squandered another chance, A beautiful Routledge cross found him unmarked on the back post, but his volley crashed into the side net, he should of done a lot better as he had plenty of time to control it and then shoot.

The 17 minute mark seen us grab a second, Dempsey involved again and he was really cutting up this defence on the left wing and his low cross was met by Collins John and he turned it into the net with a deft little flick on the near post. John should have had his hattrick minutes later but his powerful shot grazed the outside of the left upright, Dempsey and McBride involved in the build up.

By half time we were in complete control of the game, Dempsey was fantastic on the left wing and McBrides skill and strength on the ball was also causing a lot of problems.

The second half was more of the same and despite making a lot of changes we still controlled the majority of the play, disappointingly we didn’t get another goal, mainly down to composure in front of goal, Dempsey, Runström and Davies all missing real good chances. 18 shots on goal and only 7 on target told the story, we should have done a lot better considering where some of the misses came from, but it was something to work on, Collins John man of the match award was well deserved.

With 3 days break before the next game on Sunday, the squad travelled as a group and did the tourist thing, the highlight for me was probably touring Belgrade, the mix of architecture was simply amazing and the contrast between old and new was something to behold. It wasn’t all play though as we had training and held a couple youth clinics in the time, its good to see the players get involved with the youth, although one of our players did show a certain disdain for it, I’ll leave you all to guess who that could have been.

Sunday the 16th

Wholesale changes were made to the team for this game against Sindjelic which included both Runström and Helguson starting up forward and Tony Warner starting in goal, Helguson should of continued our great starts lately but he missed a sitter from 5 yards out, not even troubling the keeper. It took a goal mouth scramble in the 20th minute to get our first goal, Jimmy Bullard managing to poke the ball in the back of the net from a few feet.

Our second goal came in the 25th minute from a Brown free kick down in the left corner, his cross was met perfectly by the head of Papa Diop who smashed it past defenders and keepers alike much to his delight, Steve comments head the nail on the head “And that is why we keep him, love him or hate him he is great to watch” I had to nod my agreement.

The goal of the game came a few minutes later, Micovic sold Knight the perfect dummy and then moved into position about 25 out, he smashed a drive into the top left corner that gave Warner no chance, he barely had time to turn his head and see it sail into the back of the net.

The first half finished with both Diop and Helguson missing good chances which would of extended our lead and that’s how the second half started, both players missing good quality chances again, and despite dominating the second half we once again couldn’t add to the score, Runström really needs to work on his composure in front of goal he’s getting the chances and working hard to get into position but his finishing has been poor at best. Papa Diop took man of the match honours in our 2-1 win.

Tuesday the 18th

I decided to give the players a bit of a revup for this game, Partizan were a good team and we needed to take our chances when presented with them, show a little composure in front of goal, and atleast make the keeper work, instead of making it easier for them.

The talk seemed to work John scoring with less than three on the clock, Bocanegra at left back awarded the assist. Bocanegra started the move that seen us get our second as well, his pass down the left allowed Helguson to cut back a cross which Diop got on to, he smashed it into the back from 10 out, a slight deflection helping him out. At half time I was pleased with our effort we were starting to string passes together which were getting us good chances, The forwards were even getting the shots on target. More of the same was the message at half time and it payed off, some great movement around the box, seen Bocanegra get free on the left, his cross was inch perfect and Simon Davies was there to head the ball into the back of the net for our third.

Just after the hour Davies grabbed his second and our fourth, Bocanegra’s free kick wasn’t cleared and Davies was on hand to place it in the back, The sensational performance was completed on 85 minutes when McBride again showed his strength and skill on the ball to force a good save from their keeper, he could only parry it though and Radzinski was on hand to capitalise and score our 5th.

The game ended on a sombre note when Routledge rolled his ankle pretty heavily and had to come off the game, the swelling was instantaneous and it didn’t look good for the young Tottenham loanee, Palms our head physio headed of to hospital with him suspecting significant ligament damage, scans would tell the tale.

We celebrated the successful tour that night with the team heading out to one of the popular night clubs, where I am glad to say everyone had a good time, except Wayne Routledge that is who was back at the Hotel with Ray Lewington nursing a nasty ankle injury, Jason Palmer said it would require minor surgery when we got home and he wouldn’t see to much action until late September.

We got back into London on Wednesday night and after talking to Steve on the trip back I think a few of the players are starting to come around, some of them are just hoping my in experience wont cost them instead of thinking it will outright.

Thursday the 20th

Routledge went in for ankle surgery today after consultation with Tottenham and their head Physio Henna Horth, both agreeing that surgery was the best option after going over his medical assessment.

Most of my day was spent interviewing Scouts and after most of the day I narrowed it down to 5 applicants, Steve and myself then went over the remaining applicant and went into a bit more depth, we finally agreed on two, Gary Seward and Roger Barton were both offered contracts in which they accepted. Roger was particularly good with finding raw talent so he was assigned to the under 18 competition, Gary Seward on the other hand had the right talent to become a good opposition scout, so we assigned to that task for the season.

Catching up on other news it seemed the reserves had a mixed bag in there two friendlies so far they started with a good 2-0 win in Scotland against Forfar and then were crushed 6-2 against League Two side Mansfield. Kia Bachard and Chris James had been the standout players in the win, while Bachard was again good in the second game, but young Max Noble was our best player on the park in a bad defeat.

So far things seem to be going well enough, even the supporters on the forums seemed to have toned down their disapproval of me, which is a positive sign, they still think that appointing me was a bad decision but in light of the recent friendly games and the style in which we are playing they will give me a chance to prove myself. I’ve been approached by the administrator of the FFC forums to write a monthly summary on the happenings of the club, I’ve agreed to write one every second month if time permitting maybe every month.

Late Friday afternoon I had Hamburg manager Huub Stevens enquiring about the availability and cost of Diop, to which I promptly told him he was a required first team player and not for sale, there was also rumours of me trailing Watford youngster Adrian Mariappa.

Training is coming along real well and both me and Steve have been impressed with the transistion in tactics, we’ve implemented a few of the tactics we wish to play and so far they are working well, in the Home game against Reggina tomorrow we will implement a few more slight variations and see how that works out, all things going well we should be up and running by the opening league game against Arsenal.

retired_manragh

The Home Fans

A pretty big game today, and my first in front of the home fans, and we were against quality opposition in Italian Serie A outfit Reggina, they were tipped for relegation this year from their division but a lot of that was due to the -11 points they started with from a match fixing scandal, I remember vaguely some details, but its not something I really had access too, and truthfully I'm more concerned with out progress than looking into the past of other teams.

We went in with our strongest team available, I think its paramount to get off to a good start in this game, as we don’t want to be chasing goals in such an important first game at home, my pre match address was just stick to the team plan, move the ball around and look for opportunities, if you think something is on then go for it and trust your instincts.

The 8000 strong crowd cheered the players as the were announced when they came on to the pitch, I was hoping for a bigger crowd but it was a friendly after all, still they had a decent noise emanating from them, which got louder when the ref blew the whistle to start proceedings.

I was hoping for a real good start with an early goal but it was Reggina who had the first chance, Rosenior gave away a foul just outside the penalty box on the right wing, Modesto had a crack but it was wide and high.

Our first chance was from a corner, Brown floated it in over the back, Pearce was there but failed to make decent contract, and the ball fell to Jimmy Bullard but he managed to put it over with a slight miskick on the half volley.

Davies forced a good save from Enyeamea in goal a couple minutes later when Brown fired in another corner.

Brown again in the action again on 11 minutes, a nasty tackle sees Jason Palmer called onto the ground to take a look at him, while receiving treatment Reggina win another free kick within range but once again its high and wide. Palmer gives us the signal that Brown is fine to return on to the pitch.

With 20 minutes down Bullard sends one down wide left for Brown to chase, and he’s showing no adverse affects from his ankle tweak a few moments ago, the cross swings into the box but gets partially cleared, Diop is there and heads it into the side netting, close but no cigar.

We press again this time down the right and Davies is streaming down the wing with ball, he squares it to McBride who keeps it moving forward, flicks it back to the right just outside the box for John to get, He’s having his shirt pulled and we get the free kick in good position. Davies and Diop are there but Davies takes it, powers it through the wall and it takes a slight deflection leaving their keeper wrong footed, the crowd erupts and were on the board.
Were looking ominous for the rest of the first half and Diop in particular is menacing their Nigerian keeper, but the big Nigerian is up to it and saves twice from preventing his African rival from scoring.

The fans give a hearty applause for our first half efforts but once again were a little wayward going forward 13 shots with only 4 on target.

No big talks at half time from me, just keep it going and changes will come a little later in the game, until then stick to the plan, 3 minutes in we were rewarded, Diop blocked a pass and Bullard was first to the loose ball, he sprints forward going past an opponent and heading towards the right post about 45 out, a great diagonal pass through the middle channel let McBride in, a steadying touch and then he strokes the ball back across the keeper, 2-0 and the fans are loving it.

The hour mark comes up and we are in complete control, so I make 10 changes, Niemi is the only one to stay on the pitch, as the players swap over the crowd gives a hearty applause.

The new 10 show they can do it just as well as the starting ten and we looked like taking a 3-0 lead when Helguson put it in the back after a deft touch from Runström, but it was ruled offside, it didn’t matter too much as 4 minutes later Helguson had a goal, Smertin the architect, a brilliant interception the key.

A solid 3-0 win over good competition is an ideal start in front of the home fans, and it should go along way in allaying some fears, Collins John just shaded Jimmy Bullard for the man of match honours, a really good team effort and that’s what I tell them in the post game talks.

There’s a lot talk and speculation going on in the transfer market and we are no exception, I'm asked about Watford’s Mariappa, it seems that both mine and Steve’s visit to Watfords game has been picked up, he’s just one of a few players I'm looking at I inform the press and before long Adrian Boothroyd is issueing a hands off warning.

After talking it over with Steve, we decide its worth the gamble so we make an official approach, he isn’t going to come cheap so we offer 300K over his valuation of 1.4 mil, if we can get him for under 2.5 it should be a good deal, all we can do now though is wait.

The next few days is pretty hectic, Diop is unhappy at not being able to leave to go to Hamburg and is spouting his mouth off in the press, so I get Steve to bring him into the office, I had this real good speech prepared but his demeanour when coming in just annoyed me, so he got the abrupt version, “You’re still under contract here for two years, and I have no intention of letting you go this year, if at the end of the year you still feel like you want to move, then ill see what I can arrange, but until then I expect you to toe the line, and I don’t want to hear any more crap in the press about it, consider yourself officially warned” his response was as expected, he didn’t want to play here anymore and couldn’t see why I wanted to make him, with that he slammed the door and left, Steve just chuckled and said he’d calm down in a week or two, hopefully there weren’t too many more offers, or we could see things get ugly.

Stu Benson also brought to my attention that we had 24 players coming out of contract at the end of the year, a lot of them were the younger and reserve players but in there were a few noticeable first teamers, namely Niemi, Jenson, Bocanegra and Radzinski.

retired_manragh

The last hit out

Our last friendly game came around pretty quickly and it didn’t prove to be to much of a challenge, taking on Conference team Oxford at their home, I mixed the starting line up a little giving starts to a few of the youngser players and sitting a few of the bigger name players on the bench, such as Diop and McBride. A noticeable inclusion to the side was young New Zealand international Chris James, his continuing good form in the reserves pre season campaign had earned him the chance to join the squad.

As expected we dominated possession and shots at goal but to Oxfords credit they defended well and at half time we had only managed to score the once, Björn Runström scored the goal, finally showing some composure in front goal with a looping header over the keeper, Davies supplying the cross.

I made a few changes during the break including bringing on Kiwi Chris James, and I must say I'm pretty impressed with his endeavour playing on the right wing, he showed good skill on the ball and his passing was crisp and clean. His cross into the box on the hour lead to a penalty being given after Helguson was dragged down and I'm pretty proud of the players for giving the youngster the chance to grab a goal, he made no mistake either, a firm strike just inside the right post looked in no doubt, especially seeing the keeper dived the wrong way.

Diop, McBride and Brown all came on during the last 15 minutes, and the 12000 plus crowd were pretty happy with seeing the quality of these men, Diop didn’t let them down he setup our third which was given as an own goal and then smashed home a 30 yard pile driver that had the crowd in raptures.

The game finished at 4-0 and I accepted an invitation to stick around for an hour or so afterwards to sign a few autographs and talk to the fans with the rest of the squad, after that it was the hour long trip back to London where I received a message to call Mr Adrian Boothroyd at Watford concerning Adrian Mariappa.

The conversation went well and I can only praise Mr Boothroyd’s professional manner after speaking for around an hour we agreed on a deal, 2.2 million up front with a 30% sell on clause, all we had to do now was hammer out a deal with his agent.

retired_manragh

retired_manragh

The end of July, start of April was a pretty busy period, the FA wanted all the squad numbers submitted which meant more paper work and then there was all the club paperwork for the board that I had to sign off on, couple in training, going over scouting reports, projections and other miscellaneous stuff it was pretty hectic.

We also had our first club function in which we had the jumper presentations and announced the club captains for the year. Michael Brown retained the captaincy while young Moritz Volz was given the vice captains and in a surpise to some me a Steve decided to make Papa Bouba Diop the deputy vice captain, we were hoping by giving him an important role in the side it would improve his demeanour and might want to make him stay and help the club progress, it might had an adverse affect as well, but its one of these things were time will tell in the end.

We held talks with Mariappa’s and his agent and he drove hard for a good deal for his client, but some of his demands just weren’t feasible such as the large signing on bonus he wanted for his client, I countered with what I thought was a fair offer and left them to consider the offer, we had plenty of time to hammer out the finer details with the transfer deadline still a month away, but I would like to see him training with the squad as soon as possible.

The first day of the month didn’t go to plan, Jason Palmer gave the all clear for Lastuvka to return to full training, and we had good news with Volz and Montella returning to light training but Zak Knight twisted an ankle which would put him in doubt for the season opener against Arsenal and Brian McBride’s knee was causing him pain, after consulation with Steve and Jason we decided to send him in for surgery to remove some bone spurs on his knee cap, he would be touch and go for the season opener as well.

The board meeting went pretty well, they were happy with pre-season form and playing style of the team, and were happy with the wage budget, they also didn’t have any problems with the potential signing of Mariappa for 2.2 mil. Other than that it was just paper work, going over some numbers.

Totalbet.com released the Premier League Title odds and it was no surprises that cross town rivals Chelsea were 6/4 favourites with Man United 7/4 closely followed by Arsenal and Liverpool at 2’s. Tottenham and Blackburn were the next best at 25 and 40 to one respectively and we were given the imposing figures of 300/1, we were actually one of the favourites to be relegated which was a little surprising but I'm guessing my appointment had a bit to do with that.

Recapping on a few of the moves over July seen Downing to Villa for 12.25 million, while Juan Arango joined Tottenham for 10, Chelsea also bolstering their stocks with Frank Ribéry from Marseille and Pablo from Atletico for 9 and 6 million. Arsenal had the only other note worthy purchase and that was attacking midfielder Thomas Hitzlsperger from Stuttgart for a couple mil.

retired_manragh

Anticipation

Into the new month and I’ve signed my first ever player for the club and not without some concerns either, Mr Fayed came to me just before we signed our end and expressed concerns with signing the youngster, and urged me to reconsider signing him just yet, I told him I had a feeling about the youngster which seemed to smooth things over, I didn’t really though, have the feeling that is, more like a vague recollection of his name.

Adrian Mariappa 19.yo, D RC great pace, technically sound. £2.2 million.

Vice captain Volz returned to training, but Tony Warner joined the injury list with a nasty hamstring strain that would see him out for 1 or 2 months. Chelsea once again showed they had plenty of cash this time signing Palacio from Boca for £12.5 mil.

With a week to go before the season start there was a sense of anticipation and eagerness in the camp, training was scaled back a touch to allow us to be fresh for the first game and we were going to need to be, Arsenal according to our scout reports were looking good.

Chelsea and Liverpool kicked off the season in the Community Shield and Chelsea came away worth winners with a 2-0 score line, Ballack and Essien scoring the goals before the half time break, in a game where they dominatied possession, things were made a little easier for them when Gerrard was brought off after only a minute of play when he collided with Drogba.

We had 4 playes picked for international friendlies with Smertin, Runström and Jenson all coming on as subs in their respective games and doing well, while the fourth member Elrich sat on the bench all game in Australia’s friendly.

Scout Billy Arbuckle rang me and said he had found all he was going to in Scotland for the moment, unless I wanted him to start scouting the games he was idling about, there were some decent prospects but in truth we had enough young talent in defence now so me and Steve decided to send him off to Italy, they were renowned for their excellent defensive players so we were hoping he could find something suitable there.

2 days before the actual first Match Christanval was ruled out, a heading accident at training would see him miss around a week a with a bruised jaw, it meant that Mariappa would definitely be making his debut for the club along with a few others.