Raptor

Two certainties in life: History is written by winners, and internet forums are full of losers. One of them will be crowned FMS World Cup 2006 champion though, so this thread will feature about a dozen stories of failure, and one full of gloating.

Don't believe everything you read, you have been warned...

Raptor

April 30, what kind of idiot dared to call me for business-related manners on Queens Day? It’s our goddamn national holiday!

On the other end of the line was Franz Beckenbauer. Yeah I know, I didn’t believe it at first either. Must’ve been the gallons of beer I had since last night. Why would that annoying tw*t ring me on a day like this? And isn’t it supposed to be a national holiday on their side of the border as well? The sixty-first anniversary of Hitler’s death and all that.

To be fair, the man Beckenbauer had good reason to call. His protégé Rudi Völler, well-loved manager of the German national team and promoter of Rijkaard-shampoo, had died in hospital two days ago. The poor f*cker… if you thought I had a lot of beer today, you should’ve seen him after Germany’s 1-0 win over our lot four days ago. Drank maakt meer kapot dan je lief is, we say over here… To the Dutch, it was only a friendly (still the best official party line to take in the aftermath of a painful defeat), to the krauts, it meant the world, and to Bild Zeitung it meant the World Cup. The idiots should know better, the big one’s a couple of months away still.

Anyway, the team everybody loves to hate needed a new manager to lead them to World Cup glory on home soil in the coming months. And nobody wanted the job… The handful of decent German managers had big money contracts at even bigger clubs, so the unthinkable happened: The DFB decided to look abroad for their new Führer.

Beckenbauer claimed I was the first foreigner on their (his) list. Needless to say, I took that with a pinch of sauerkraut, but I suppose my two UEFA Cup victories and DFB-Pokal won in a three-year spell at Borussia Dortmund were acceptable credentials. Oh, and my brother lives in Germany, apparently that helped too. When asked why Der Franz didn’t take the job himself, he told me it was for the same reason Johan Cruijff never took control of the Dutch national side: nothing to gain, and everything to lose. Cowards, them superstars, if you ask me…

At any rate, German intelligence failed hopelessly (as per usual). Maybe Beckenbauer had too much to drink himself, because surely, SURELY someone in the chain of command should’ve figured appointing a nationalistic Dutch b*stard like me would NEVER want to see another German captain lifting the World Cup? Then I realised there IS no chain of command, just Herr Beckenbauer to answer to.

As disgusting as the thought of leading Germany was, judging by this week’s friendly, they ARE a threat to Oranje’s date with World Cup fate, so I took the job, determined to sabotage Die Mannschaft. I wanted to take them as far as I could though, to give my homeland a free passage into the next round should the Netherlands and Germany ever meet.

bartley_m

The World Cup loomed for South Korea. The under rated Asian nation had out performed many more recognized footballing countries at the 2002 world cup, but that seemed a distant memory. An ageing squad was finding it hard to live up to expectations, and despite a creditable second place finish in their world cup qualifying group (inspired by newly appointed captain [b]Park Ji Sung[b]), nobody expected much at the 2006 showcase.

The Korean FA however, expected a highly ambitious 2nd round exit for the country. With new manager Bartley McCormick at the helm, a nervous and unassuming squad stepped off the plane at Munich airport. Their time had come. Were they to be heroes, or the failures that everyone predicted them to be? They were to find out over the next few weeks. Besides, it’s not the like the new man in charge knew nothing about the squad he was inheriting. Was it…

Peacemaker7

Vive Espana!

Spain. The perenial failures of World Football. All the talent you can ask for, they inevitable feck up against the most stupid of crap sides. I've had Spain before. They failed. In fact if I remember correctly I've had Spain in a couple of online World Cups. They failed. Bloody screw ups.

And yet here I am again, managing Spain. You have to ask yourself, why for feck sake! Yet by the law of averages, and the quality of player, they have to bloody well win sometime. Don't they?

And if not, well I know a few names who wouldn't mind have an Espana Air flight blown out of the sky. Capice?

WLKRAS

Revenge for '74... and '40-'45

After the dramatic 1-0 loss against Der Mannschaft, the Netherlands were in uproar and demanded just one thing, the head of Dick Advocaat. To prevent a public lynching that would take place a few days later regardless, the KNVB had only one choice. Sack “The Little General” and have him replaced. But with the leagues drawing to a close, most managers were committed to their clubs. Yours truly however had been sacked from managing Ajax, after almost running them into the ground financially. The fact that we’d won every possible prize in the season before did not mean much to the Ajax board as they decided that money was important to have after all.

So when Mr. Jeu Sprengers, chairman of the Dutch FA phoned me up late in the evening to ask me to do the job of guiding the Netherlands to a World Cup victory, I accepted it with a drunken laugh. When I woke up the next day, in a strange bed with some distinctly average looking broad and a hangover the size of a small cargo freighter, I asked myself what I had done. It wasn’t until I read the newspaper that I realised I was going to be the next manager of the Dutch team. So in a good month from now, I’d probably be the next man to be publicly lynched on “De Dam”

Macca_SAFC

The team without a nation

Yugoslavia is not one of the most well known nations. In fact I'm not entirely sure it still is a nation. More of a region of several different countries. Which is nice to know as a manager.

I suppose there is nobody to disappoint if my team fails...or please for that matter. It's going to be tough without any real fans cheering us on. It's going to be even tougher finding the headquarters of the Yugoslavian FA to find out how I ended up managing a non-existent country in the World Cup finals.

Raptor

The Dutch press made me Enemy of the State #1 and called for my passport to be revoked. Henceforth, I would be known as Anton Mussert. If they only knew… I’d be a knight in the Order of Orange Nassau!

For now, I had to play my role, and that meant picking a strong side. I tried to be as convincing a German as I could be, picked defensively strong players, and beat all creativity out of the remaining ones. A handful had to be axed to get a final squad of 23, and for the last place, I decided to pick a token “foreigner”. Either Ailton, (an assimilated Brazilian), or Thomas Brdaric… So, a dârkie or a dirty Slav… what would a real German do in my situation? I tossed a coin (a guilder, needless to say), and Ailton was the lucky (?) one.

To be honest, we lacked a really good creative player, though Deisler, Neuville and Ballack weren’t bad. I’d have loved to have someone like Tomas Rosicky on board though. Come to think of it, isn’t he from Sudetenland? Nah, let’s not go there…

Our opening game was against Ireland, in front of 80,000 in Munich’s Olympiastadion. A nation expected, which I thought was a bit rich from the Irish. They did well to kill whatever creativity “my” boys had, and in our rather special 3-6-1 formation, we had a lot of possession, but few goalscoring chances.

With Kahn in goal, Wörns, Hertzsch and Metzelder across the back and covered by that little fascist pr*ck Jens Jeremies, and to a lesser extend by a defensive-minded Markus Babbel on the right hand side in midfield, creative duties were Bernd Schneider’s and Sebastian Deisler’s. Böhme, Neuville and Klose would have to get themselves into scoring positions. Ballack got cold feet and feigned injury if you ask me.

Ireland stood their ground, and even a 20-minute spell for subs Ricken and Jacker couldn’t get them paddies on their knees. My heart bleeds, as the final score was 0-0.

BobBev

Unknown Scot Takes Charge Of Nigeria

In a shock move the Nigerian FA have appointed 48-year-old Bob Beveridge as their manager for the forthcoming World Cup campaign. The Super Eagles, or as Beveridge insists on calling them now, the Glen Eagles, are hopeful of putting on a good show for their fanatical fans and many have questioned the appointment of a managerial nobody but Beveridge has been talking a good game thus far, stating that he intends his team to put on a good show in Germany and that group opponents Indonesia, Yugoslavia and Portugal can expect a few surprises.

Daz the Imp

When you hear Brazil mentioned in footballing terms, there are probably a lot of things that spring to your mind. You probably think of all the wonderful talent that the nation has produced in bygone eras such as Pele and Zico. Maybe you think of all the time Brazil have lifted the World Cup - '58, '62, '70, '94 and '02. Perhaps you think off all the current talent that Brazil showcase in Ronaldo, Ronaldinho and co. I am, however, willing to bet that you don't think of an Englishman called Darren Fowler. Not once. Infact, I'd even go as far as to say that you never think about Darren Fowler, no matter what you are doing.

With Germany 2006 coming up, that would all change. An Englishman called Darren Fowler was appointed the new manager of Brazil and he was charged with the task of bringing home the World Cup. The time between his appointment and the announcment of his first squad, the World Cup squad, flew by and all of a sudden he and his players were in Germany itself.

The squad he picked raised a few eyebrows, but not a massive amount. Yes, there was no Ronaldo, but any football fan worth his salt would already have known that Ronaldo was injured and would have been unable to compete anyway. Fowler chose to replace him with Léo Macaé, who only had experience at U-21 level. Macaé wasn't the only one without a cap however as Araújo, Bruno and Carlos Henrique were all called up to the squad for the first time as well. The would be joined by some highly experienced heads though, with Brazilian-cap centurion Roberto Carlos and Rivaldo (one cap short of a century) named amongst the 23.

With the first game against Scotland, who had also appointed a new manager just prior to the World Cup, nearing, Fowler had little time to decide upon a tactic and the players he thought could help him achieve the title of World Cup winners...

WLKRAS

Thankfully, the appointment of Dutchman Anton “Raptor” Mussert as Germany manager took the attention away from my arrival as manager which was pretty low key in the end. With a 23-man squad announced, full of technically gifted players who would bring Total Football back to the Dutch team, the nation was expecting in the tournament opener against Sweden.

And the team delivered. With an outstanding performance by Rafael van der Vaart, scoring 3 goals, one of them a penalty. The Dutch team ran riot in midfield, with Van der Vaart and captain Davids controlling the balance of play, while wingers Robben and Van der Meyde provided the attacking drive along the wings. Goalkeeper Edwin van der Sar was only called into action twice to deny import-Swede Zlatan Ibrahimovic. Other than that, the backline of Heitinga, Stam, Hofland and Bouma was hardly called into action and most of the action happened at the other end, where the strike force of Van Nistelrooij and Kluivert were dangerous enough, but were unable to get on the scoresheet. Not that it mattered in the end.