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I was waking up to a rather annoying noise. My mobile phone was ringing like crazy and I cursed under my breath. Who was calling me at this ungodly hour of the day. My head was buzzing like a million killer bees were swirling around, it was aching like I had never felt before and I was generally not in the mood for pleasantries. Having been unemployed for the past 2 months really sucked big time. So going out for a drink usually had no after effects, except for the massive hangovers, like this morning.
So I picked it up and answered: “Yeah, who's calling in the middle of the, ...errrrrrrr, afternoon??”
“Is it Mr. Þráinsson speaking?”, came from the other end of the line. “Yeah, how may I help?”, I was feeling a touch better, but not a whole lot. “This is Brian Mackie, the Chairman of NEWI Cefn Druids, I understand that you applied to take over the manager position at our club back in mid-June. Is that application still standing??” “Cefn Druids?? Where in the world is that and what is that??”, I asked in a rather perplexed tone. “This is a small team in the Welsh Premiership and a perennial relegation battler. We've been looking at our options and you seem to be the only one who might be able to save the club from going down this season. Are you interested??” “Leave me your number and I'll call you in a couple of hours, I haven't had my shower yet and still nothing to eat. I'll mull it over and then get back to you”, I said in a rather non-committed tone. “I don't want to promise anything now, if I'm going to have second thoughts the moment I put down the phone.” “I understand son”, came from Mr. Mackie, “take your time and I'll be looking forward to hear from you, good day to you then.”
Well, this was a bit of a turn up wasn't it? The very last thing I expected was a job offer from abroad. I started thinking back to a challenge made to me by a few friends back in June. We all decided to apply for a job at managing football clubs. I had put in an application to quite a few clubs. I started thinking back. What clubs did I apply for? Þróttur in the Icelandic Premiership, KS in the Icelandic First Division, Newry in the Northern Irish League Premier Division, Maidenhead in the English Conference South, Tamworth in the English Conference National, Mansfield in the English League Two and finally Cefn Druids in the Welsh Premiership. All the teams, except the Druids and KS, had told me that I wasn't suited to the task and I had basically decided that the next step was to drink myself into a stupor and forget all about a footballing career. It had been something like 2 months since I had applied and I was more or less forgetting what I was applying for. So I decided to take that shower, have my breakkie and a few cups of very strong coffee, to clear my head and think things over.
True to my word, I called Mr. Mackie two hours after we hung up. “I'm ready to come out there and have a chat with you at Cefn Druids”, I said, “but I'm afraid that I have no idea where to go. I don't have the slightest idea where in Wales your town is and much less an idea how to get there.” He chuckled and said, “Don't worry, we'll have somebody waiting for you at the airport. Where will you be touching down?”
I thought about it for a while and then told him that I'd be landing at Stansted Airport in Essex. I could only afford a low rate airfare anyway, so I had to travel on as tight a budget as possible. He said it was no problem and he'd arrange for someone to meet me there.
I got an airfare to Stansted the following day and decided to embark on this hopeful journey. My flight touched down at Stansted at around 11:30am and I was through customs and immigration, such as it was, about an hour later. True to his word, Mackie had arranged for someone to pick me up. What I hadn't expected was that he'd be there in person. Some 5 hours later, we came to Cefn Mawr, the Welsh town in which the team resided. We went straight to the Plas Kynaston Lane stadium, or should I say football ground? It's a ground of around 2000 spectators, with only 300 seats. I liked the ground, since it reminds me a lot of my local ground, Hl*ðarendi (the home ground of my local team Valur in Reykjavik). The training facilities were surprisingly good, considering what I had expected, so I decided that I didn't really have much to lose. I settled on the hefty salary of £80 per week and the chairman took it upon himself to arrange for my housing. He had a small apartment in the basement of his house, with a separate entrance, which he told me I could use. Good thing, since I'm not too keen on buying a house over here while my future is so undecided.
I decided to have a look at the players and staff at my disposal and I have to admit that I'd probably have been better off with a bunch of babies, learning how to kick the ball about. The players were quite badly out of shape, lacked all basic skills and were more or less rubbish. I now understood why the team was always in the relegation mire. I had an assistant manager, Aled Rowlands, who was also a player on the team. He is one of the best, but getting very slow. So he might see limited time on the pitch. Though I might see some use for him in an anchoring role at times. He's the best of a bad bunch in reading the game, so having somebody to mop up in front of the back 4 is basically a must.
I sat down with him and started looking at the training schedule on offer. I didn't like it, since it was likely that the players might suffer all sorts of injuries, so I cooked up a training schedule for the team. Special training schedules were set up for the strikers, midfielders, defenders and goalies. “Don't be too hard on the lads”, Aled reminded me, “they're all part timers, so they don't have the same amount of time on their hands as the full time professionals.” So I adjusted the training accordingly and then set about meeting the lads in person. The team had already played one game in the Premiership and lost it 0-1 at home against Haverfordwest.
My first task would be in the Welsh Challenge Cup Prelim Round 1. So as my starting team, I asked Aled to pick the team for me, after I'd set up the tactic I planned on starting out with.
So here's the lineup:
GK Louis Mackin, DR Gareth Barton, DL Alec Stacey, DC Mark Hobson and Marvin Arthur, DMC Steven Brooke, MR Shaun Jones, ML Tom Ramasut, AMC Kieron Durkan, ST Marcus Taylor and Troy Hayder.
Subs: Price (GK), Rowlands (DC), Chalk (MC)
Now a word about this team:
Barton is a central defender, but a rather poor one at that, so this was my only option for the first few games. He'd do the least damage as a fullback, I thought. Steven Brooke was anything but a defensive midfielder. He's a striker and I soon decided to swap things around on the pitch, since nothing was happening. So about 20 minutes into the game, I moved Jones into the DMC position, Durkan into the MR position, Taylor into the AMC position and Brooke into the ST position.
I started off with a rather attacking setup, but with a rather defensive outlook on life and counter attacking. That bore fruit in the final minute of the first half, when Brooke headed home the only goal of the match. 1-0 at home and I couldn't have asked for a better start. There was one moment of trouble though, when Jones got injured, 16 minutes from time. That gave me a small headache. I had already used two subs in the game and only had a goalkeeper left on the bench. Now what was I to do? Did you put the reserve goalkeeper on the pitch for him, or ignore the injury. In the end, I decided to send the reserve goalie on and played him behind the two strikers. Of course he didn't do much good there and ended up with a rating of 1, which is hardly surprising. Still, a win is a win and we were off to a good start.
Three days later, it's the Premiership's first match for me. The opponents were Carmarthen and before the game, all bets were against the Druids.
The starting lineup for that game:
Mackin, Barton, Dabbs (DL), Hobson, Arthur, Martyn Chalk, Durkan, Stacey (at ML), Taylor (at AMC), Brooke and Hayder.
Subs: Price, Rowlands, Jones.
Carmarthen got a wonderstart to the game, when they went one up in the third minute. A hard punishment for some poor defending. Not the start I had hoped for, so I decided to change a bit of our tactics. I called Hobson to the sideline and told him to relay the message to the other players. “Tackle hard, go at them like mad.” He duly obliged and had this strange grin on his face. 18 minutes into the game I saw why. Dylan Hughes (Car) went into a tackle with studs showing and was met halfway by Hobson. The result was that Hughes got injured and had to be taken off the pitch. Hobson didn't even get a caution. Strange that!! On 65 minutes, one of the opposition players, Richard Carter, got his marching orders for a professional foul on Hayder. That only meant that I added some attacking impetus and cancelled the counter attacking setup. Attack with all you've got and no excuses lads. In the 85th minute we got our due reward. Stacey stole the ball from Craig Hughes and laid it off to Taylor, who in turn scored a wonderful goal with a nice placed shot at the far post, from around 20 yards. This was the last meaningful event in an otherwise entertaining game. The first point in the Premiership was landed.
After this game, I decided to dive into the transfer market, with the help of my only scout. Over the next few weeks, I signed 18 players on a free transfer, in addition to the 3 that already had been brought in. A few have been transfer listed and only 1 has been sold at this point in time, for the hefty sum of £1000. 3 more have been listed and all are being scouted by other teams.
Now the games were coming thick and fast. Over the next few weeks, we played a number of games. The first one was against Grange Quins as the return leg of the Welsh Challenge Cup Prelim Round 1. To cut a long story short, my players were one up at halftime but totally capitulated in the second half and lost the game 3-1, so I was out of the WCC.
The next four games were Premiership stuff and, to be honest, I wasn't too confident in my players at this point in time. That lack of confidence was well justified, as I only scraped one draw from those four games. Lost to Airbus, Aberystwyth and Caernarfon and a lonely draw against Porthmadog. Only one goal scored in those 4 games and I started looking around for remedies. Finally I won a game, but that was in the Welsh Cup 2nd round. Against Taffs Well I managed to scrape a 1-0 victory, but only after extra time. I was starting to curse my players and decided to start adjusting my tactics too. So in this cup game, I decided to start experimenting a bit.
A flat back four, with a defensive midfielder to cover them. Left and right midfielders and two attacking midfielders behind a lone striker. That worked quite well, with the exception of my players' inability to score in a brothel.
I stuck to that formation against Welshpool and got stuffed 3-1 away. So sitting at the bottom of the division with only 2 points after 7 league games. I was really starting to think about handing in my resignation, since none of my players was picking up on the ideas I was working on in training. The simplest routines were repeatedly messed up by the players and I swear I could have done better if I was playing there myself. But with my playing days over, that wasn't really an option.
At this point, I'd like to list the players who've come in since the start of season, all of which came in by way of free transfer:
Tom Ramasut (AM L), Marcus Taylor (AM R,ST), Marvin Arthur (D C), Danny Thomas (AM C), Kevin Walsh (M C), Owain Whittaker (DM C), Aneurin Evans (D/WB R), John Reid (D C), Aaron Broaders (AM/F C), Eamonn Lindsay (ST), Keith O'Shaughnessy (M C, but training for DM C), Greg Evans (GK), Paddy Crowley (ST), Eoin McHale (M C), Mick Scully (D C), Alex Davies (AM C), Conor Ryan (AM C), Gary Moore (ST, just had to sign him for the name ), Lee Quilty (ST), Keith Graydon (AM/F C), Stephen Kelly (AM C) as Player/Assistant Manager.
One more has been sold since I took over the reigns and two more are in negotiations about a contract at other clubs. The who's been sold is Michael McLean (ST), who went to Evesham. The two that are in negotiations with other teams are Gareth Barton (D C) and Andrew Edgar (M C).
I've added a couple of coaches as well, so the players are finally looking like they're improving a bit.
Staff added since the start of season:
Craig McKenzie from Stirling (scout), Colin O'Neill from Dublin City (coach), Ronnie Scott from Alloa (scout), Tony Rodwell from Southport (coach) and Daði Sævarsson from Þór Akureyri (scout).
So far my search for an extra physio hasn't been successful, mainly due to the fact that those who apply all want so much higher salaries than I can offer. At the best of times, I can offer them around 40 quid per week, when they want 120 minimum. I'm still advertising and hope it will give something.
Now I'm getting the game up to date and will then keep on reporting on it as the season progresses. I don't know how frequent the updates will be, but rest assured that I'll continue with the game
*************
So October 19th 2005 and now I had a game against title favourites TNS . I started off by telling them that they still have a long way to go before the title can be secured and I meant to end their unbeaten streak. For some reason their manager didn't see a reason to respond, but I couldn't care less. I had to help my players gain some confidence, since they were so low on it, as well as low on morale.
I decided to fiddle with tactics again and now went with a flat back four, a defensive midfielder, two central mids, two attacking wingers at AMR and AML and a lone striker. It was to prove an inspired change.
The lineup for the game was:
Mackin, Evans, Stacey, Hobson, Arthur, Whittaker (DM C), Mazzarella and Broaders (M C), Taylor and Ramasut (AM R and Left) and Hayder (ST).
Subs: Evans (GK), Lindsay (ST), Kelly (AM C)
The game then got underway and we started off much better, scoring in the second minute, courtesy of Troy Hayder. They bounced right back and equalised in their next attack, so it was back to square one. Hayder wasn't about to give them anything and added two more goals before halftime. TNS weren't about to give up so easily, so they redoubled their efforts and started attacking like crazy. That resulted in them getting their second of the game from a set piece. Poor marking let their goalscorer, Woods, in at the far post where he got his second of the game. Hayder wasn't in the mood for any leniency and got his fourth of the game after a pretty move, involving almost every player on the pitch, resulting in a pinpoint cross from Taylor and a tap in from Hayder. To add insult to injury, TNS had Nicky Ward sent off in the 87th minute. It was a straight red for pushing one of my players in anger and rightly so. The ref was rather card happy in the game though, issuing a total of 15 yellow cards and a red. I don't know where he managed to cook up all of the bookings, but this was rather silly, to say the least.
I had only just sat down in the kitchen when there was a knock on the door to my humble abode and outside was chairman Mackie. I offered him to step in and join me for a cup of tea, as I've become quite hooked on Earl Grey. He took me up on the offer and then started praising the way we had demolished TNS that night. I was quite happy to praise my players as they had deserved everything on the night. What a performance!!
Right then my mobile started ringing and on the line was a news reporter from one of the national newspapers. He asked me what I thought of TNS's title ambitions and I couldn't help be be quite nasty towards them. I told them that I wasn't surprised to see my side beating a side supposedly 'gunning for the title' this year. To win a title, they'd have to back up their impressive claims with impressive performances on the pitch, ending by saying that 'one out of two isn't bad'. The journalist was a bit bemused but printed it regardless. For some reason, the TNS management has decided to remain silent so I'll just drop it. Seems like they're not very interested in some mind-games.
Just because I forgot to mention this at the start of the thread.
I'm running FM2006, patched to 6.0.1 with Iceland (all), England (all), Ireland (all), Northern Ireland (all), Wales (all), Scotland (all), Italy (Serie B and above) and Spain (2nd and above).
A Large database and full detail for all the divisions except Spain and Italy, where I opted for normal detail.
Nov 2nd 2005.
It's been 3 games since that excellent win against TNS and this team is one hell of a yo-yo, to say the least. One moment they're ripping the opposition apart and the next, they're crapping in their trousers like they're getting paid for that. The last three games have been extremely attacking, especially after I decided to start with the same formation as I did against TNS. Only one change of personnel came about in the last game of the three, but that was when Whittaker came back from injury and replaced Rowlands, who'd had a bit of a stinker in both games. His ratings were much higher than he deserved, so I decided to drop him out of the team for the time being.
So against Connah's Quay it ended level at 2-2, after our complete domination of the match, which was played at home. Then we played against Caersws away and beat them 2-1, but only after going all out in attack and nipping in near the end to score the winner. Finally it was Grange Quins at home and we totally overpowered them on the pitch, outplayed them all over the pitch and still lost the game 2-1. How we didn't manage to get anything out of the match I'll never understand. Their goalie had a performance of a lifetime and will probably never come close to this again. My bloody goalkeeper decided to give away a goal very early in the game, when he decided to charge way out of his box, only to lose the ball and gift the opponents a goal. I really felt like ripping his head off and feeding it to the dogs. Lucky for him, there were no dogs in attendance.
After the game, I told the opposition manager that I didn't see any signs of his team staying up, especially with the way we outplayed them. He came back with a similar claim, but I had the last say in it, when I told the press that his attitude at the game had been way out of line. I'm also very unhappy with the Welsh FA that I had to play games on subsequent days. Having a league game on a Monday, a game that wasn't even televised, and then having to go out again on the Tuesday night for another game. Absolutely ridiculous and I'm fuming over it. I just wish I had a channel to vent this frustration. Diabolical bureaucratic incompetence. Bah.
Thanks mavericktango. I'm trying to battle it out but I have such incompetent barstewards at the back and nobody seems to be able to score in a brothel, with the exception of one player
Before taking charge of the Ancients, I was unemployed, as that's how I started the game. This is proving to be a challenge and a half
**********************
2nd Dec 2005
The lads keep on frustrating the hell out of me. I keep on mouthing off to other managers and most of the lads seem to be OK with that. At least there's been no sign of discontent about it yet. If the players would only respond on the pitch, then I'd be quite happy. So here's the lowdown of the month of November.
Penrhiwceiber v. Cefn Druids
A game in the Welsh Cup saw the Ancients, as the Druids are called, batter the opposition for 90 minutes and come away with a deserved 2-0 victory. In truth, the margin should have been far greater, but for some reason I came up against one more goalie on top form. Bloody annoying that. Scorers on the night: Hayder, Graydon
Llanelli v. Cefn Druids
It's back to the bread and butter stuff of the Premiership. The Ancients totally dominated the game and ran out the deserved 3-1 victors. Goals coming via Hayder and Ramasut (2). Llanelli got a consolation goal in the 90th minute, but that didn't stop my team from trying to increase the lead.
Port Talbot v. Cefn Druids
The third away game on the spin. We got a dreamstart to the game when Hayder found space at the near post to slot in a goal in the third minute. Port Talbot equalised in the 18th minute, only to find that Hayder isn't my top scorer for nothing. He scored another one instantly, to put us up 2-1, a minute later. I wasn't to enjoy much luck in this game, as the referee didn't exactly like my players. Right after I had gained the lead, he sent off my stand-in left back Dunn, for a second bookable offence. 8 minutes later, my most consistent players, Hobson, suddenly scored a weird own goal. Smashing the ball into his own net from about 40 yards out on the left wing. As if I wasn't playing with enough of a handicap, Hayder got himself sent off on 40 minutes for a second yellow, this time for trying to swap shirts with one of the opposition defenders, prematurely. So I had to change things around quite a lot and I decided to keep playing an attacking game. 3 at the back, with a DMC in front of them, with my two wingers set as wingbacks, my AMC as a MC and ST on top. Ouch, the things one has to do when down to 9 players. In the second half my players were very dangerous when going forwards, but unfortunately that didn't happen very often. On 55 minutes I decided to take my goalkeeper off, as his strange runs out of the box were getting too dangerous and I managed to hold on to a good 2-2 draw. Following the game I fined both of the red carded players a weeks wages, which they were understanding of and didn't make a fuss over it. At least they seem to understand the hardships of trying to stay alive in this division. I've released one of my young players, basically because he's rubbish and was constantly moaning about playing time. I can't be arsed to listen to such nonsense anymore. I've put a few more players up for sale and most of them are being snapped up for relatively low prices. I guess I can't really complain, since they haven't cost me much either. Shedding some baggage salary wise is very necessary, since some of the players I inherited are earning way too much for the team to bear.
Cefn Druids v. Newtown
What can I say about the kings of inconsistency??? Completely outplayed the opponents but unable to score until it's too bloody late. 0-1 down at halftime, due to some atrocious defending and even worse finishing and then 0-2 down on 50 minutes, due to more horrible defensive work. Finally Ramasut pulled a goal back in the 63rd minute, but unfortunately that turned out to be the last goal of the match. The lads had plenty of chances, but noone seems to be able to convert them. Seems like I have to start searching for more strikers in the next transfer window. This is getting ridiculous. Final score of the night 1-2 and I feel like going out on the booze. I feel sad about having to rely on poor Hayden so much, but he's without a shadow of a doubt, our best player. At least he gets into scoring positions and he converts a high percentage of his chances. Right, off to the pub we go.
I've accepted an offer for Durkan for £3000. He'll be off sooner than later I hope. His £200 p/w is way too much for a cash strapped club like the Ancients.
A Druid or an Impostor. 
), Lee Quilty (ST), Keith Graydon (AM/F C), Stephen Kelly (AM C) as Player/Assistant Manager.
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