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I have decided to write it in the style of a diary. I hope to capture all the decisions that we as FM2005 managers make throughout the game, adding a bit of fantasy thought as and where required. Dates shown are as they happen in the game.
The team I have chosen is Carshalton Athletic, for the simple reason they are the closest club to me in the game, apart from Tooting and Mitcham, and I cant be bothered to edit them into the Conference South.
My last effort with Carshalton left me facing the dole queue in 2005/06 season, so don’t expect a meteoric rise to the premiership.
I hope you enjoy my story, and all feedback, both positive and negative will be most welcome.
At 11am I was unveiled as the new manager of Carshalton Athletic F.C. The local media had gathered, and our Chairman, Steve Friend, introduced me to them. Steve was very complimentary about me, and stated he was looking forward to a very successful period under my management, and had every faith in my abilities.
I thanked Steve for his kind words, and the opportunity to wet my feet in management with Carshalton Athletic. I stated to the press that I was extremely ambitious, but realistic in my projection for promotion to the Conference National division within the next 3 seasons.
I then took a range of questions from the local reporters:
Q: What do you think of the quality of the squad you have inherited?.
A: I haven’t as yet had the opportunity to evaluate the squad. This is my first day here. In the afternoon, I hope to be sitting down with George Wakeling, my assistant, to assess the squad as it stands, and look at areas that we may need to strengthen.
Q: Have you had a chance to meet with the players yet, and if so how have they reacted to your appointment?
A: Nope, I haven’t met up with the squad as yet. We will meet up tomorrow, on Monday morning, when I take my first training session. I will be speaking with them all at that stage, and outlining my thoughts and plans. I'd like to state that everyone will start with a clean slate.
Q: As I understand it, you haven’t got any money for buying players. Is that going to be a hindrance?.
A: No, not at all. Where needed, I will be looking at the free transfer market, and loan deals. It might be that I don’t need to bring anyone in. we will just have to see.
Q: As I am sure you are aware, Sutton United are Carshalton’s archenemies. Have you got a message for their manager Mr Rains?.
A: No I haven’t. I prefer to concentrate on my team not on somebody else’s
With that Steve ended the press conference, and showed me through to my office. Waiting for me was George. We had a brief chat, went and got some lunch, and then got down to the serious business of looking at our current squad:
Stuart Searle, Age 25, Goalkeeper: Decent reflexes and handling. Good at one on ones. First choice keeper at this stage, but will probably be on the look out for someone better.
Paul Borg, Age 22, Goalkeeper: Brave and agile, but doesn’t have the core abilities to make the grade. Will be transferred when better quality is in place.
Ricky Bell, Age 21, Goalkeeper: Pure rubbish. Already on the transfer list and will stay that way.
Colin Hartburn, Age 19, Right Back: Young player with good pace and acceleration. Defensive attributes leave a lot to be desired but will see how he develops over the season.
Aaron Cole-Bolt, Age 20, Left Back: Again young with good pace and acceleration. Has the advantage of good tackling. May get the nod in the 1st team.
Matt York, Age 25, Left Back: Good physical attributes but lacking in defensive qualities. On the transfer list and will stay there.
Mark Costello, Age 32, Central Defender: Reasonable defensive qualities but not the quickest around. Age is against him but with little cover at centre back at this time will remain on the books – for now!.
Ellis Hooper, Age 18, Central Defender: Excellent tackling and marking attributes. Time on his side. Hopefully a star of the future, and a definite 1st team starter.
Gary Elliott, Age 30, Central Defender: Good tackling and marking. Fairly quick. Will partner Ellis at the back.
Peter Wood, Age 30, Left Back or Defensive Left Midfielder: Fairly good all round stats. Not exceptional anywhere, but not useless. Will compete with Aaron for the left back role.
John Hamsher, Age 26, Right Back or Right sided Midfielder: On £500 a week but appears to be worth every penny. Takes a penalty as good as anyone in the game. Is extremely determined and composed. Will start at right midfield.
Tim Murdoch, Age 19, Central Defensive Midfielder: Very creative and excellent passer. Could be a starter.
Des Boateng, Age 24, Right sided Midfielder: Fairly good passer but that about it. Surplus to requirements. Listed.
Tutu Henriques, Age 22, Right sided Midfielder: Again not a bad passer of the ball, and adequate stats at crossing and dribbling. Fairly quick. Due to an excess of right-sided midfielders will be listed, but looking for 2k to part with him.
Danny Carroll, Age 28, Right or Central Midfielder: Good physical and mental attributes. Not so good on the technical side. Will remain on the books for his versatility.
Neil Le Bihan, Age 28, Left or Central Midfielder: Dead ball specialist. Quick, alert and likes to run with the ball. First team starter.
Dale Marvel, Age 18, Central Midfielder: Another good youngster. Good passing but may not get him in the first team straight away. Hopefully he will develop into a quality player.
Mark Hawthorne, Age 30, Central Midfielder: Has some good qualities but most are awful. Listed.
Sam Saunders, Age 20, Attacking Right sided Midfielder: Good pace, acceleration, crossing, and dribbling. Good cover for Hamsher.
Marlon Patterson, Age 21, Attacking Left sided Midfielder: Good pace and acceleration. Has a decent first touch but lacking in other areas. Will stay for now until a decent replacement is found.
Adrian Stone, Age 24, Striker: Good finishing and heading. Moves like a snail. Back up striker.
Kevin Lock, Age 22, Striker: Not quick, can’t finish. £200 per week. Listed!.
Nic McDonnell, Age 23, Striker: Good anticipation, fairly quick. Finishing average. Pushing for a starting place.
Kevin Cooper, Age 29, Striker: Can finish, is quite quick, and has good off the ball stats. Will start.
Conrad Kane, Age 40, Striker: Old father time has run his course. Still quite pacey but listed!.
Goalkeeping summary: Will need to get in a decent keeper at some point. Noted as a weak area of the squad.
Defensive summary: OK at left and right back, but with only three central defenders there isn’t enough cover. Urgently need one more Centre Back, Maybe two.
Midfield summary: Plenty of options on the right side, not enough quality in the middle, and limited options on the left. Need a quality midfielder who can play both left and central.
Attacking summary: Out of 5 choices only one is a definite starter. Two are listed and the other two are only back up quality. In desperate need of some more fire power.
I decided to tell my scout, Nick Brian, to start looking for quality players in England that wont cost us anything (easy task then!!). In addition I asked George to give me a list of players available on loan that might be interested in coming to the War Memorial Ground. From those I submitted bids on the following players:
Adam Birchall, Age 19, Striker: Listed for loan by Arsenal. Has Superb Finishing, is pacey, and is a Wales U21 International.
Lewis Buxton, Age 20, Central Defender: Lewis is listed for loan by Portsmouth. Great all round Defender, and quick with it.
Wayne Henderson, Age 20, Goalkeeper: Aston Villa reserve keeper, with great attributes.
The final act of the day was to have a look at the scheduled friendlies. I didn’t want too many
Matches, as the squad was quite thin, and I didn’t want to tire them out. I cancelled friendlies against Oldham, Dagenham and Redbridge, and Grantham. This left pre season games with Rushden (H) on 18/07/04, Hinckley (A) on 24/07/04, and Droylsden (A), on 03/08/04.
After an exhausting, demanding, and thoroughly busy day it was off to bed, as I had to be up early tomorrow to sort out my pre season training regime, prior to the first day of training. How had the first day gone I asked myself?. Not bad I thought. Not bad at all.
I drove in to the training ground at 7am. This gave me a couple of hours to sort out a regime for the week. The guys were lacking in fitness and conditioning and as such I wanted to concentrate on the physical side of things for a while. I had just over a month to go before the first league game of the season, so I figured if we concentrated on stamina and fitness training for the first two weeks, I could then change to incorporate technique and tactical training in the next two weeks. The keepers may only need a week of fitness training, but I would re assess that later.
I also took a look at the staff at my disposal, and came to the conclusion that we didn’t have anywhere near enough staff. George, bless him, was no where near good enough to be my assistant, so I set about letting the job centre know I was after an Assistant Manager, 3 Coach’s (one of whom must be a keeper Coach specialist), 2 Scout’s, and another Physio. The Job Centre said they would circulate the details, and come back to me with interested applicants within due course.
After training I was notified that Bournemouth and Worksop had put an offer in to loan Wayne Henderson. I was confident that he would choose us before Worksop, but was a little concerned that Bournemouth might be a more attractive proposition for him.
I received notification that Arsenal, Portsmouth, and Villa had accepted my proposals for the loan of their players.
Checking on the training, George stated that a few of the players were responding well, but the majority were being overworked. As such, I decided to put more emphasis on the defensive side of training, and give the goalkeepers their own schedule.
Welcome to FMS, good luck with your first story. Decent enough start, but one thing you might want to consider is the use of the bold and italics options to highlight headers and names etc, but thats entirely up to you.
thanks for the advice peacemaker. I meant to post the squad details with names in bold, but when i copied it from my word doc it didnt copy through the bold. Will certainly try to use it in the future.
15th July 2004
I got a call from Nick Bryan, our scout. He had watched AFC Wimbledon’s Keeper Matt Martin, and was impressed with him. After looking at his stats I concluded that although Bryan wasn’t of top quality, he was a reasonable back up. I advised Nick I would put the player on my shortlist, but wasn’t going to make any immediate bid, as I was waiting to see if Henderson was coming to us.
Redbridge came in for Ricky Bell. They weren’t offering anything for him, but said they would give 20% of the value of the next sale of him back to me. I accepted the offer, and then broke the news to Ricky.
17th July 2004
Runcorn were also chasing Adam Birchall. I was advised that they had put a loan offer in. I really need that player I thought. Will I get him?.
Checking through the training with George, I am pleased to note that most of the players were now responding well to training. There were a few lazy buggers but they seemed to be the ones who were on the transfer list. Probably a bit upset at being listed I guess!.
Late in the day, I get a call from Cirencester. They are also interested in [B]Bell[B/], and want to know how much I want for him. I tell them that I’m happy to let him go on a free, but want 25% of his next sale value.
Wayne Henderson will be a star :cool: - hope the lad realises Bournemouth's a dump and accepts ( and the others too btw ) Good start so far, and good luck.
Game Day arrives. Doesn’t start off too well when I get a call from George saying he has heard Barrow are also after Birchall.
We are at home to Runcorn. I note that they have already had two pre season games, so they should be quite a bit fitter than our boys. I plump for a 4-4-2 formation, and select the following players:
Searle, Hartburn, Cole-Bolt, Hooper, Elliott, Hamsher, Le Bihan, Murdoch, Carroll, Cooper, and McDonnell.
I instruct the guys to keep it tight and play counter-attacking football to start with. I also advise them to play at a slow tempo, as it was 24 degrees – very hot in other words. Danny Carroll got the nod as Captain.
91 Loyal supporters turn up to see my first game in charge.
The first half was a disaster. Runcorn were by far the better team and deservedly took the lead in the 18th minute. Hooper got caught to far up the field, which left us open to the counter. Things got even worse a minute later when Hamsher was injured and had to be replaced by Sam Saunders. We managed to survive till half time without conceding any more goals, but I think that was more down to Runcorn’s poor finishing more than good defending by us.
I got the lads in at half time and decided to instruct them to take the game to the opposition. Cut out the respect crap I said, and get stuck in. Lift the pace and take a few chances I said.
Things improved immediately, and McDonnell went close. The match was much more even and both sides had chances to score. After about 65 minutes, I noticed a few of the lads flagging so I brought on Marvell, Patterson Stone, and Wood to brighten things up. It’s wasn’t until the 87th minute that we finally got a shot on target – Cooper bringing a decent save out of the Runcorn number one. In injury time Runcorn got another breakaway goal, leaving the final score at 0-2.
If I didn’t realise this was going to be a difficult job before, I certainly did now!
Carshalton 0 Runcorn 2
Back in the dressing room I got a call from Keith Bayley, our Physio. He was at the hospital with John Hamsher. John had broken his toe. He was going to be out for about two months. I thought about throwing a few cups of coffee around, but decided it might not be a good idea to run the risk of creating any more injuries at this stage. Oh to be a Football Manager!
Diary of a FM2005 Manager 
) Good start so far, and good luck.
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