08/09 Barrow League 1
Once again, the board set their sights on staying up, while the bookies offered a stingy 14-1. We brought back 3 of last years loanees, added a £30k striker and a freebie midfielder. The wage budget was still £5.7k but we now had £60k in transfer funds. A loan defender was also acquired, changing my ageing rearguard for the first time since 05/06.
At the halfway stage, we lay in 10th spot, having one of those win a game/lose a game seasons. Along with 80% of all clubs in the Football League, we hoped to scrape into the play-off (surprisingly!). We offloaded a defender, leaving the club with only 3 players from the 04/05 season, and sold a striker for £65k (new record) with a whopping 50% sell-on clause (turned down a bid of £120k for him, so I really do wish him success).
Against all predictions we had a run that took us to 6th, when our GK broke his leg. The scouts were hastily summoned and splendidly found a veteran rotting in the reserves of the team in our divsion with a £60k wage bill (how the other half live- one of their second string was on more than our whole squad!). We gambled our future by paying £12k for the pensioner and were rewarded as we hit 3rd spot with 4 games to play.
On the last day of the season, we were still there, a point clear of Yeovil but found ourselves away at bitter rivals Morecambe. Both games ended in draws, leaving us with consecutive promotions, to my total astonishment. At that moment, I wished that SI had a "dance on the pitch like the Luton kerb-crawler" function installed (apologies to anyone not 30+ or from England for that comment). To celebrate we bought one of our 2 year loanees for £12k.
Conf Nat: Pos 3rd W22 D11 L13 Pts 77
FA Cup: 2nd Round lost 1-5A Colchester (chased game with 9 men, when fell behind in 76th minute)
League Cup: 3rd Round lost 0-1A QPR (beat 3 L1 teams in all cups this season)
Vans Trophy: Southern QF lost 0-2A Oxford (why are we still in the Southern section-will we one day play in the final against the Northern winners who live 200 miles to the south of us!)
Avg attendance: 3805 (got better in Conference in 06/07!)
Apologies if this thread sounds of bragging to anyone, I'm just putting what's happened, this type of success never happens to my teams. The last time I took a team to 3 promotions, I was playing the very first CM (fun but very easy if you're too young to remember)
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