7th Season 2013-2014 – Queens University Belfast
League – Northern Ireland Second Division
Media Prediction – 7th
Board Expectations – Establish safe position
Bank Balance - $600k in the red
Transfer Budget – $0
Wage Budget - $3.2k per week
Summary
Strange place this Northern Ireland. One can wind up playing more cup matches than league games (not that I did, you have to win for this to happen). It seems like you play 30 games in 90 days but after the New Year 4 in 90 days. This makes for a very slow, drawn out second half of the season.
Shipped none out and brought in 4 on transfers. Three of these turned out to be not needed but at the time I felt I needed cover and experience for a squad whose average age was below 20. We started with an 8 game winless streak which took us out of two cup competitions but had meant only two losses in the division.
After that rough patch of adjustment this turned into a fun team. We scored from all over the place, second leading scorer was a DL who was deadly with DFKs within 30 yards of the goal. Gave up too many but as often as we gave away a late equalizer we scored a late equalizer.
Finished a more than respectable 6th and the team is in place, save for a couple of solid DCs, to challenge for the division and maybe steal some hardware. Ominously, however, is the ever expanding torrent of red ink. So for the next season I am going to pare back the under 18s and reserves even though I managed to stay within the wage budget.
Results
Position – 6th
P 22 W 7 D 10 L 5 Pts 31 GS 45 GC 38 GD +7
Cup Competitions – Intermediate League Cup (out in the group stage), Antrim Trophy (2nd round loss), Intermediate Cup (3rd round loss but beat a first division team before losing to a premier reserve side)
Board Confidence – Happy with our progress in competitions but worried about the bank balance (like that is my problem?)
Of note from around the islands north of France:
Bolton went into receivership
My old team from Basingstoke is in the BSS promotion playoff final versus Billericay! I am sure no competent, unnobbled LLMer cares about this but once the game is played I might just post the result.
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