At least we didn't lose against Hibernian, but after the match, when the managers did their post-game handshake, McDaid made sure to remind me, "What you said before the match, about this being another home game for you, you haven't really been paying attention to our improved home form, haven't you? Don't pull a fuckin' Neil, buddy!"

Some time after that match, McDaid managed the sale of the century as he somehow snookered Everton into purchasing Ben Williams for 50 thousand quid. Why, Everton, why? Hibs getting rid of ol' reliable Ben was a huge victory for Hibs but a massive loss for Scottish football and I'll miss him. Truly an end of an era for Hibs. (If Ben sees any first team action for Everton the supporters are going to mob up and murder Martinez, I'm sure.)

As much as I like to make fun of Ben Williams, Jamie Macdonald isn't that much better of a keeper, so I have agreed to a pre-contract with Dundee United goalkeeper Marc McCallum. He has quality kicking and handling and should be an improvement over Macdonald, who is leaving at the end of the season.

Our fortunes took a sharp decline as we couldn't defend Tynecastle against the Partick Thistle invasion. Partick had their way with us as they won 4-1, and I got annoyed with Ryan Stevenson's antics. I put him on the transfer market for 230,000 pounds, which he was allegedly worth. No offers. 170K? No offers. 60K? No offers. Free? No offers. Fuck you, Stevenson, you unsellable piece of rubbish, you're going into the reserves. Stevenson tried to protest, and I said, "Shut up, I'd ship you to Siberia if I could, you lousy bastard." I also adjusted the teamsheet, putting Callum Paterson up front and Jamie Walker on the right wing.

We stayed at Tynecastle as Motherwell visited, and it proved to be a barnburner, at least in the first half. Each team scored 3 goals, and Jamie Hamill had 2 of them for us. We were down 3-2 when John Sutton valiantly kicked our corner kick attempt into the net. Unfortunately, Sutton was a Motherwell player, and the half ended 3-3. The game got much more dull after that, with no goals, and no breaking of the deadlock. However, the point put us ahead of St. Johnstone on goal differential!

Our next match against St. Johnstone was a vital one, the winner would go 3 points ahead of the other. It also meant the return of Danny Wilson from a back injury, and he did not disappoint, scoring the first goal to take the lead. Our back line were the stars, as Brad McKay also scored, and that was the winning margin, 2-0, as St. Johnstone had their usual poor performance. We were able to go 4 points up on St. Johnstone as they lost again, and we drew against Ross County 1-1 in an unmemorable game.

We're climbing up the table, and Ally McDaid has to watch out now, as we're chasing his Hibs to get out of the relegation playoff spot.

Matches Played: 24
Points: 18

Hampden Park, Glasgow. 2nd February 2014.
While watching his close friend Dave Gordain's Hearts team take on Dundee, who had beaten Hibs to get this far, in the Scottish League Cup semi-final, Ally McDaid fears for his job. He knows that after just two points from 7 games and an unwanted record of conceding goals late on (His team had dropped points due to late goals 4 times in that spell, amounting to five points lost), his position will soon become untenable if he fails to turn things around.

Worse, Nuno Gomes is crocked. Broken bones suffered during a match meant that the Portuguese veteran was going to miss the rest of the season, and possibly a large part of next. His large wage package, one of the highest at the club if not the highest, meant that even if he does make a comeback, both him and his club will be a whole lot worse off when he does.

McDaid recalled the unsettling sight of the moment when Nuno knocked on the door of his office, before entering on crutches to reveal he was contemplating retirement. While that such scenario may do wonders to improve the team's wage budget, to lose his team's top scorer and someone who had rescued so much hope for the green side of Edinburgh made Ally lose plenty of sleep.

He had given up every free moment he had to search for a replacement striker, but having only just sold Paul Heffernan to a club down south, he probably needed two new additions.

Jake Cassidy was one of them. The Wolves loanee was on low wages and at least offered some chance of replicating the form of Gomes in the veteran's poacher position.

The next was very unclear. On deadline day McDaid finally gave up his searching and made a proper, lucrative bid for a player. Young Cammy Smith from Aberdeen seemed to fit the void perfectly, but it would take quite something to prise him away from his current club.

First McDaid had tried offering the oblivious wanker that is Adrian Luna, alongside fellow transfer listee Dougie Horne, and to his surprise Aberdeen accepted. A contract was productively and successfully negotiated with Cammy, only for first Luna, and then Horne to reject their prospective new teams. And so the deal was cancelled. Twice.

Then a monthly-fee deal was struck, but a miscalculation by McDaid regarding his club's finances led to the deal being cancelled again. And so, with just a few hours to go on transfer deadline day, a panicking McDaid was forced to agree to a clause-ridden deal to capture his man. And when the exact same contract was accepted by Smith for the fourth time in a day, he finally had his signing. It was incredibly risky, but all McDaid could do was pray he would save Hibernian from relegation.

Hearts, truly loving life under Gordain at the moment, ran out 3-1 winners and are through to the final.

Previously, at Hibernian F.C...

First of all, Hibernian went to high-flying Dundee United looking to cause a huge upset. They went in at the break with a one goal deficit to overturn, but a Liam Craig penalty midway through the second half looked to have rescued a valuable point for the Hibees. And then the next of many last-gasp goals happened, and Hibernian were sank in the 88th minute.

An agonisingly similar match away to Aberdeen followed, as Nuno Gomes had poked home for 1-1 only for another despairing late winner in the final 10 minutes. In both matches, Ally had been screaming everything he knew of at his team with a view to them holding on, but they always seemed to collapse late on.

Then came the visit of St Mirren to Easter Road, and Hibernian looked on course for a vital victory thanks to James Collins, only for a ridiculously poor equaliser to find the back of the net for the away side. A Rob Kiernan clearance bounced off the back of a Hibs player and fell perfectly to Max Clayton via a miskick, and he gleefully accepted his gift. If ever there was a time to use the description of "unlucky", it was now for Ally.

So when Celtic paid a visit to Edinburgh, his team stood very little chance of claiming an astonishing second straight victory over the title-chasing Celts, and they did little to prevent the favourites from running out 3-0 winners. McDaid was left to rue missed chances with the score still only at 1-0 going into the final third of the game, but it was not to be.

A loss the following week at Inverness and a win for 9th placed Kilmarnock merely increased the worries of all associated with the club, with Hearts breathing down Hibs' necks in 11th and there now a total of four points between his team and Killie.

We're holding out for a hero 'till the end of the season. Let's hope Cammy's heroics pay off.

Well done on keeping Hearts marching, Eb. McDaid's seating is boiling up at the other end, however. I don't know who Cammy Smith is but Cassidy was pretty good in FM13, if that reassures you in any way

It started when Danny Wilson headed in a corner kick at literally the last second to give us a 2-1 win over St. Mirren. I knew we had stolen one, and I knew we had the potential to escape the threat of relegation altogether. My push was redoubled when I found out that the 11th place team has to compete in a 4 team playoff against 3 Scottish Championship teams.

Our fortunes continued on as we defeated Dundee (not Dundee United) 3-1 in the League Cup semifinal, facing Partick Thistle in the final. And then we ran into that team. I don't even call them Inverness anymore, I just call them Scottish Arsenal. Arsenal is their parent club so they take in free loans from Arsenal, and they are players like Yaya Sanogo and Lukasz Fabianski.

Using their free loans to devastating effect, Inverness/Scottish Arsenal defeated us both in the FA Cup and the Premiership 3-1.

However, our fortunes changed once again, we had a home game against Celtic, and of course, Edinburgh's official sport is taking the piss out of Neil Lennon, and this time was no exception, with me mocking him in the prematch presser, and Hearts really making a mockery of Celtic on the pitch, running out to a 3-0 lead, and finishing with a 4-1 lead, the biggest victory over Celtic and the biggest display of dominance over them this season. I might have gotten carried away a bit and told Neil to suck it in the post-match presser. Whoops.

We also got one over on Motherwell, beating them 2-1 on a fluky free kick goal from Billy King. The youths came in, and most of them were unremarkable, as I expected, but the youth coaches were raving about this one guy, Keiran Telfer. He's a striker/right winger, he is very determined, has pretty good physical attributes, but is very raw and will need to be developed. He's also good at long shots, but that's not an attribute I plan to emphasize.

One of the bright spots from the Celtic and Motherwell games was backup goalkeeper Mark Ridgers, he started due to a minor injury to Jamie Macdonald, and had very good games, conceding a goal in each but making several excellent saves.

Matches Played: 28
Points: 27

I thought Celtic were the best team in Scotland?! Really good updates from both you (Eb) and Rab

Celtic are still very much top but they've a nasty habit of dropping points.

There was no update today because of a crash dump taking away a bit of our progress. Sorry everyone, we will be back on it!

Unfortunately we suffered another crash dump today, on the same date at exactly the same place. We've carried out the recommended steps for resolving the issue so hopefully we can keep this going, and if not, we will simply start a new save somewhere else.

Apologies, Robert.

After turning away Aberdeen at home, 2-0, I had the most important match of my very short career, the Scottish League Cup final against Partick Thistle at Hampden Park, the Scottish national ground, and it was going to be an honor to manage a team playing a game there. If there was a game that this resembled, it would be the most recent Super Bowl (Seahawks vs. Broncos). I'm not going to pretend it was even close. We played the Seahawks, and Partick played the Broncos. It wasn't even 25 minutes in, and we were up 3-0.

All we had to do was close it out, and close it out we did, as Callum Paterson put the icing on the cake in the 71st minute, putting us up 4-0, and that was how it would end, amid the celebrations of everyone associated with Hearts. The fans were excited to avenge their finals loss from last season, and re-gain the trophy that had evaded us and them since 1962. The board were also delighted with our victory, and I knew it was time to take advantage of my leverage, lest I lose it. I asked for a contract extension, which the board rubberstamped. I now had some job security!

We continued on our high, beating Dundee United 3-1, the highlight of which saw Dundee United's goalkeeper come out of the box to contest a loose ball against our Jamie Walker. He failed to scoop it up, and Walker claimed the ball and had an empty net, which he easily scored against. We came back from a goal down to win 3-1. Sadly, we couldn't keep up the form against Killie, we were frustrated to a 0-0 draw.

After what seemed like forever, it was finally time for the third iteration of the Edinburgh Derby this season, and no less important. Killie were a point ahead of us, but we had a game in hand. Whoever lost would likely be in the playoff spot. I was just motivated to finally get a win over the one team we couldn't seem to beat, with Hibernian escaping in dubious fashion each time. This time there would be zero escape for Hibernian.

The whistle blew, and the game kicked off. The first half had some great plays, after setting the tone for the match with our possession and passing, Hibernian weathered the storm and started frustrating us with their direct ball approach. We left Jordan Obita unmarked and he scored the first goal. It didn't worry me much, we had the ability to come back, and we did late in the half, with Callum Paterson breaking through Hibernian's back line to head a Jamie Walker cross into the net, and it would be tied 1-1 at halftime.

The second half betrayed the first half's promise, however, and the only eventful play was a goalmouth scramble in front of Hibs' goal that somehow proved uneventful for us. I knew it was our best chance and we wouldn't likely get another one. The full time whistle blew and the match ended 1-1, with fans, coaches, and players of both sides feeling frustrated and unfulfilled.

Matches Played: 32
Points: 35

Fighting For Our Right To Party

Tynecastle Stadium, Edinburgh. March 30th, 2014. Derby date #4.
It's the day of the third Edinburgh derby match of the season, and Ally McDaid leads his unbeaten Hibernian derby side into the match full of praise, having been on the right end of a springtime upturn in fortunes.

Weirdly though, he feels far more nervous than before this time around. The previous two games saw a win and a draw for his side, but this time around Hibs are clinging on to their Scottish Premiership life by the seat of their pants. This game was no longer just a derby, it was for the first time in years a relegation battle.

Previously, at Hibernian F.C.

February hadn't started so well for Ally McDaid and Hibernian. They were well and truly dumped out of the Scottish Cup, falling to a whopping 6-2 away defeat at the hands of Dundee United, despite taking the lead. With the score nearly in deadlock with just 10 minutes to play and a place in the next round looming, McDaid ordered his boys to get up the field and find the equaliser. The result was devastating...for Dundee United anyway, as they claimed a further three goals late on to snatch it. Oh well, at least they only had one focus now, right?

A potential must-win fixture at home to Ross County was next, and all appeared to be going to plan for an unlikely, and rather fortunate, victory. Captain James McPake had scrambled home a corner shortly after half time, and the Highland side, who has bared little threat during the opening 45, looked destined for failure.

Former Ireland - and Hearts, begrudgingly - striker Stephen Elliot had different ideas, however, and two well-taken goals in a very small period of time turned the game on its head. Hibs pushed, but they lost again, and now McDaid was getting more and more anxious by the day.

Then game the crucial away tie against fellow strugglers Kilmarnock, and thankfully wingers Jordan Obita and Geoffrey Mujangi Bia produced on the day to score their first goals in Scotland, and subsequently put Hibernian 2 goals ahead. Another former Hearts man, this time Darren Barr, pulled one back later in the half, but a second half-strike from James Collins eased the nerves, and handed McDaid a priceless 3-1 victory in his battle to survive relegation with the Hibees.

This win would spark a run of four more games unbeaten, with firstly Liam Craig sweetly bending in a free kick to upset Dundee United 1-0 at Easter Road, and then another priceless 3-1 away victory at doomed, managerless St Johnstone helping Ally edge closer and closer to survival.

A promising 0-0 draw at home to Motherwell would follow the next week, meaning with just two games to go before the end-season league split, Hibs were giving themselves every chance of staying up. They still had an onlooking Hearts, and a battling Killie, to get past in their battle however.

To The Present...

Keeping with tradition, Ally McDaid is attending the regularly-packed press conference ahead of Tynecastle's second, and last, Edinburgh derby of the season. And, as with tradition also, he is well and truly mocking the press alongside his friendly rival Dave Gordain.

"There have been a lot of mind games between you and Dave in recent weeks. How do you see them impacting the match?" asks one, dozy reporter.
"Mind games?!? Oh shush, Jose!" McDaid laughs as he slips in unnoticed with the par.

Another journalist doesn't seem to be the match-watching type, instead favouring the usual codswallop they send out in The Scottish Sun, and adds some laughably critical questions about McDaid's right back.
"Former Jambo-turned-current Hibee Fraser Mullin hasn't had a great season, has he? Do you think the pressure is finally getting to the young lad?" they ask.
"Pressure? Bad Season? You've got to be kidding right, Fraser's been one of our best defenders this season and all you can do is crticise such a young, up-and-coming player? Go back to your exclusive scoops and your one-paragraph match reports, this is ridiculous," bemoans a now-furious Ally, as he holds back the urge to whip out his middle finger, and leaves the room silently again.

"Bunch'a wankers, what are they like?" he giggles to Gordain as the two cross paths.

An "underdog" speech plagiarised directly from your typical American sports movie later, and the managers take their seats in the dugout. A rapturous applause for Dave Gordain turns to a series of boos and jeers from the home (and, dare one say it, away) supporters upon Ally's arrival.
"Nice to see you as always!" he bellows, as he slumps into his chair in the dugout.

Half an hour into the game, and Hibs have barely been out of their own half so far. The fact that they are a trained direct, counter-attacking side seems to have escaped Ally's assistant, however, as he is furiously assuming the role of manager in screaming instructions of retaining possession and keeping it lowly. "We'll beat ya, OBITA" has seemingly just been invented by the Hearts support and is speedily circulating around the ground like an electron.

And then, something magical happens. An apparent hopeful long ball nests itself on the skull of lone hitman James Collins, and a clever, if perhaps slightly unintentional, backwards flick-on finds its way to, would you believe it, destined to lose Jordan Obita, who uses his pace to get beyond the last man before firing an unstoppable angled shot from the acute outskirts of the box for 1-0. These are incredible scenes, and the Hibernian bench are going crazy. Obita runs over to his thankful, applauding manager, silencing the crowd as he does it, and high fives his new boss.

The lead lasts until stoppage time, but seconds from the half-time squeal comes a major blow, which grandly knocks McDaid back to Earth. A lovely move and then beautifully placed cross from Jamie Walker finds an unmarked, vastly escaped striker in Callum Patterson, and he has the simplest of tasks to glance it in to the back of the net past Barel Mouko in the Hibs goal. There's heartbreak, but that doesn't mean there isn't hope.

It is probably accurate to say that Hearts have been much the better side so far, but even more so that the Hibs players are shocked to receive an unfamiliar vote of confidence from their gaffer. Heading down the tunnel in expectance of a half time bollocking, the appetizer of the regular post-match hairdryer treatment, the green-shirt donned players encounter a warm reception from their coach.

He simply tells them to keep it up and that they're playing as good as they have all season, without so much as half a mention of the latest goal currently denying them a lead. And so McDaid sends them out knowing they are now full of confidence and destined to get something out of the game, with a lavishing smile on his face too.

The second half is nothing like the first, with only a goalmouth scramble from the Jambos causing any sort of excited reaction from the fans, though the emotions quickly turn to shock and disappointment as the home players suffer a head-in-hands miss, courtesy of the ball rolling along the goalline before another scramble from which Tudor-Jones gets it out.

And then the whistle is blown, and now McDaid's men take 9th place in the standings going into the final match of the pre-determined fixture list. A win in front of the Easter Road faithful could potentially see them move above their next opponents, Aberdeen, in the table, so it really is full steam ahead for a finish that would assure McDaid of his job, for another season at least.

Even better, Fraser Mullin has a plaudit-laden game in the Leith men's back line, ousting his critics for a few days at least until they jump right back on the hatred bandwagon.

Get it up ya, journalists!

Yay.

This story almost died the same death my Sasuke FC story almost died, but SI's 14.3 update saved it.

Delighted to see this back following the crash dump Congrats on winning the Scottish League Cup Eb, as well as the result v Dundee United. As for McDaid, next game should be a corker

The final match before the split was against Partick Thistle. Despite being on the road, we played like we were at home, dominating Partick, and the youngster Billy King made great plays to score two goals and help us run out huge winners against them. Things were looking good for us as we were drawn into the relegation group, with Aberdeen, St. Mirren, Hibernian, Kilmarnock, and St. Johnstone as the other teams, and we were obviously the odd team out, who would be in the Championship Group if it wasn't for the 15 point deduction.

Unfortunately, our form deteriorated at that point. We lost 2-0 to Aberdeen, and held a 1-0 lead against St. Mirren before giving up two late goals to lose. Our next match was against Hibernian.

This would be no ordinary derby iteration. Both teams were playing to ensure survival, and the loser would be pushed further into the fire of potential relegation. The press conferences were serious this time, as I had a more stoic demeanor and pulled less of the games I had before, and Ally kept his poker face up and kept acting loose in front of the media, but I knew he knew.

But once again, victory over Hibernian eluded me, and Hibernian won again, as James Collins fired a weak shot that bounced off our goalkeeper Jamie McDonald's hand and trickled over the goal line. Hibernian won 1-0, and had ensured safety for themselves, and Ally McDaid's side had pushed me and Hearts towards the fire of relegation. But I was okay with that. The only problem was, Killie kept winning, and were 6 points ahead of us with 2 matches to go. In order to escape the playoff, we'd have to beat Killie and St. Johnstone, while Killie had to lose their other match as well.

Our team finally revived and killed Killie and pounded St. Johnstone into pudding, 3-1 and 3-0 respectively. Unfortunately, Killie won their last game and would end up safe 3 points above us. However, this run of form would give us plenty of hope going into our playoff match, which would be a home and away playoff against the team that won the gauntlet among the 4th, 3rd, and 2nd placed Scottish Championship teams. That team would be Falkirk. The troops would be rallied and they would visit us first, then we would visit Falkirk. The only complication is that we wouldn't have Dylan McGowan for either match, because of his obligations for Australia.

The first match at Tynecastle was no contest. Danny Wilson scored two corner kick goals, as we ran out to a 4-0 halftime lead. Falkirk pulled back 2 goals in the second half, but were still well-beaten, and we'd just have to avoid complacency as we travel the 26.3 miles to Falkirk to finish the job.

AND DANNY WILSON PUTS IT IN THE NET AGAIN IN THE 58TH MINUTE! Hearts fans rejoice as they can be sure they have pulled off a miracle and are staying up in the SPL. Billy King's goal in the 78th minute not only makes it 6-2, but erases Falkirk's away goal advantage, like it mattered at this point. HEARTS ARE STAYING UP!

The Edinburgh Derby would be alive for another season.

Sunshine on Leith

The Falkirk Stadium, in Falkirk surprisingly. May 24th, 2014.
Ally McDaid can't help it. For the umpteenth time this season, he finds himself coming to watch his rival team, Heart of Midlothian, play. Sure, he hates the club in general, but unlike most Hibs fans in his position, he doesn't want to see them burn. Today they are taking on Falkirk in the second leg of the relegation play-off, a competition his side had almost slumped to, with the final place in the Scottish Premiership next season up for grabs.

Holding a comfortable 4-2 lead in the tie from the first leg, there is little chance of Hearts' league spot slipping away from them now, but this is Scottish football, and anything can happen. A single goal for Falkirk and all the pressure is on the Jambos.

Previously, at Hibernian F.C...

As for Ally, he stayed up in the end. His team went into the final 5 matches of the league season, in the relegation group, on a 7 game unbeaten run having taken all season to find their feat in the division. An lossless streak that had started with a huge turnaround of fortunes in a crucial 3-1 away win at fellow strugglers Kilmarnock had continued into the split thanks to another 2-1 home scrap against Aberdeen. In all fairness, most of his players had been lacklustre in the match, but captain Kevin Thomson stole the show with two collective finish from corner rebounds to triple his goal tally for the season and hand Hibs a fairly unassailable 2 goal advantage. For a rough 10 minute spell of the final quarter of the match, Aberdeen piled on the pressure but never really looked ruthless enough to equalise, and when the goal did come it was merely a consolation for their efforts.

However, the Hibernian party came to an abrupt end with an embarassing loss to rock bottom St Johnstone, the third time the two teams had met at McDiarmid Park this season compared to just once in Edinburgh. Under new management, with Danny Lennon somehow persuaded to leave his silver-lined job at St Mirren to take over the managerial position from previously sacked Tommy Wright, and having eventually found out their inevitable fate of relegation only last weekend, the home side went into the game with nothing to lose or gain. And despite heavy pressure from the Hibees, they slumped to a near-last gasp defeat when Thomson crashed down back to Earth, and knocked a free kick past his own keeper.

That defeat was damaging, and downright embarrassing, for McDaid, but they still had one more game to go before yet another away Edinburgh derby, a schedule which infuriated McDaid for not being able to give his home fans a taste of a proper rivalry (the only game there this season ended 0-0). A morale boosting win over Killie at home, thanks to an absolute pearler from Mujangi Bia 10 minutes from the end of an otherwise tough matchup, edged Hibs ever closer to survival in the league for at least another season, and a win over Hearts the next matchday would guarantee it due to nearest challengers Killie and the Jambos playing each other the following weekend.

And yet again, Hearts just could not beat, let alone take the lead against, Ally and Hibs. His team won 1-0, and it was wholly undeserved and took a fortunate own goal to see it, but it ensured survival and gave the thousands of travelling fans something to cheer about. So, upon ending the season with two dead rubbers against higher placed opponents (of which there was one draw and a loss against the latter), McDaid took the chance to give some of his fringe players a chance to shine. In the closing fixture of the season against St Mirren, Ally handed a dream start to 16 year old youth product Marc Douglas, and he did not look out of place at all despite being tired from recent U19 matches. In fact, he was the best player on the night for Hibs and certainly has a very bright future ahead of him.

To top off a great ending to the season, Ally's management finally meritted a new contract, and when Rod Petrie came knocking on his door, he couldn't help but enjoy a little fist pump. To help the club's cause and his own budget for the coming season, he even accepted as small a contract as the club would allow, citing that they didn't want to lose him on the cheap. Fantastic!

To The Present...

The second half begins and it's still goalless, but the team in maroon are dominating. Surely, they will score soon...AND THERE IT IS! It's Danny Wilson again, as Falkirk fail to defend a near post corner once more! Dave Gordain will manage in the Premiership next season, and more importantly, the Edinburgh Derby remains.

A second goal, this time from Billy King, follows soon after. McDaid feels himself leap out of his seat and cheer, only to remember that he is the Hibernian and those kind of images give The Sun wet dreams. So, he clears his throat and casually plants himself back on the chair, reverting to only a slow clap but still feeling the same emotions inside.

There was going to be a lot of change in the summer, and Ally can't wait to see it unfold.

After all, someone has to come in to be the new Leith-al weapon.