You are almost there mate. Just keep it up I believe in you. We must follow Premier League updates with Oldham next season. It will be great! Cheers

CMON YOU CAN DO IT

2015-02-10 21:11#207824 AaronHJFT96 : Squeeky bum time now eh mate? Not a huge improvement on last season, and you'll definitely need one in the next to ensure that title win! No matter what, I'm assured you'll get promotion.

It is definitely that. It is going to be a tense end to the season. It isn't the biggest of improvements in terms of performances but the continued success is always good.

2015-02-10 22:32#207831 MisterLister : You are almost there mate. Just keep it up I believe in you. We must follow Premier League updates with Oldham next season. It will be great! Cheers

I hope you will continue to follow, even if we don't make it into the Premier League!

2015-02-11 00:19#207836 Pauker : CMON YOU CAN DO IT

Now that is a bit of motivation right there! Cheers Pauker.

Oh my days that was bloody close! I would love to be able to sit here and tell you that I never doubted it for a second but it would be a bold face lie. As predicted, this season went down to the wire and one of three teams could have come away as league champions. At times it was edge of the seat football to watch, at other times it was a walk out of the room in anger and sheer disappointment; any bets on which game resulted in that reaction?

I predicted in my last update that the game against Leeds United was going to be a tricky affair with us having to be at our best to come away from Elland Road with a positive result. I did not however predict that we could go there and be shown how to play football. Credit where its due, Leeds were outstanding from start to finish; they could have easily scored more goals and were unlucky to have conceded two. Shane Ferguson and Jermain Defoe reminded us that we have a long way to go and cannot think we can beat anyone but instead anyone can beat us. Despite having aged several years, Defoe rolled back the years and showed us just how good he use to be.

I have to admit that I was doubting whether the players were going to be able to pick themselves up from the floor after that result and still have the mindset that would see us win the league title. The most important result of this final month was the one against Charlton Athletic. It was crucial that we didn’t enter a slump and went out and won that game by any means possible. Jerome Sinclair remembered how to score but it was the youngster Rolando Aarons who guided us to the win that helped the lads get their confidence back. He was outstanding and rightly deserved man of the match. It could be debated whether he deserved the player of the season award. I didn’t want to a do a joint award with Satka edging it and claiming the coveted award.

Overall, I am over the moon with how the season has ended but it should have been a much more comfortable result. An excellent cup run was a highlight along with witnessing the development of Aarons, Satka and Oseni who have a very bright future at a club higher than Oldham in my opinion. The squad is going to be strengthened in a number of areas if we are going to put in a decent showing in the Premier League and this is a task I am excited to undertake! Oh, did I forget to mention, I got interviewed for the Atletico Madrid job but failed to get the job that I would have taken if it had been offered. Maybe a jump too high at this present moment and maybe I need to be the person to lead Oldham Athletic into the Premier League.

Player of the Season – Lubomir Satka

WALSALL!!! Congrats on the title win mate Here's to a cracking Premier League Season!

2015-02-11 21:04#207886 AaronHJFT96 : WALSALL!!! Congrats on the title win mate Here's to a cracking Premier League Season!

Thank you! I think overall we deserved to win the league title but we didn't win it confidently. Another trophy added to the cabinet.

Amazing, Promotion as the Champion! Now you need to strenghten your squad to keep Oldham clear of the relgation spots!

2015-02-14 13:46#207984 TaroMisaki : Amazing, Promotion as the Champion! Now you need to strenghten your squad to keep Oldham clear of the relgation spots!

A bit of a revamp of the squad will have to take place but I don't think on a huge scale. Some experienced players will need to be brought in to help out what is quite a young squad.

Of course with the season in the Championship coming to a successful end, we enter the stage of preseason which excites me and most of the footballing world the most; the transfer window is open! Cue Jim White in his hideous yellow tie, crazy fans ultimately ruining the experience for the viewers at home and mad transfers taking place that shock followers of football.

With us heading into our first season in the Premier League, it is more vital than ever before that we improve the squad to give us some sort of fighting chance of retaining our spot in the league. This process as always started with a number of players leaving the club and that will be the focus at the beginning of this update.


There is absolutely no-one significant leaving the club with a number of players having been told earlier in the season that their contracts would not be renewed. Pretty much every player who has left the club had little game time last season, even Shaun Wright-Phillips who was brought in to add some much needed experience to one of the youngest teams in the Championship last season. The only shame is that Liam Kelly didn’t get much game time due to him being constantly injured. Soon as he returned to training and saw some time on the pitch in a return game, he was injured again. His career at Oldham Athletic definitely did come to a disappointing end but he was sent with best wishes from the club as he had been a dedicated servant to the club for five seasons.


Of course all you are actually interested in this update is the screenshot above which shows you my signings for the upcoming season. I could just leave you with that but I thought I had better provide some sort of justification for the signings, especially for the club record signing of James Wilson for £5.5 million. This particular signing is a huge different in terms of cost compared to the club’s previous record signing who was Earl Barrett, who in game is a Under 18s coach at Stoke City, who was signed for a measly £1.7 million in comparison. Wilson spent last season on loan at our Championship rivals Huddersfield Town. He finished their top Goalscorer and pretty much was the sole reason for their high finish come the end of the season; he was unlucky to have not been promoted with them but they performed poorly in the end of season play-offs.


Despite impressing last season, he was deemed surplus to requirements by the Manchester United hierarchy and their manager Joachim Low. I am quite surprised by this as the club doesn’t really possess someone seen as an out and out striker but instead attacking midfielders will have to be played in the upfront position. I am not complaining too much as I can see Wilson having an even bigger impact at the club that Rolando Aarons did when he joined. He is still young, great attributes and he can only get better. He will be starting every game possible and I can see him forming a great partnership with Jerome Sinclair who is still lacking confidence. That partnership could get us the goals we need to remain in the top flight of English football.

Jay Spearing, Luis Alberto and Oliver Norwood have been brought in to add some experience. Jay Spearing will be used in the defensive midfield position, whereas Norwood will be used as backup for the first team which I deem as justified as he has been brought in for no transfer fee. Alberto has a much harder task as he will be playing second fiddle to the player who I think is the club’s most exciting transfer of the summer, Adryan. I cannot believe that firstly, Lyon agreed to the sell the player and second, that we managed to sign him for such a small transfer fee.


Unfortunately we are gaining the signature of a player who has only appeared twelve times in the past three seasons. This is not due to any injuries but that Lyon didn’t see him as having the quality for their team. Well I know there is a difference between my Oldham club and Lyon but he definitely has the quality that we need in that midfield. My vision is to have him sat behind a pairing of Sinclair and Wilson, dictating our attacking plays as well as contributing a number of goals himself. He is another young player, who has great attributes that haven’t been harmed too much despite very little game time. I am sure that once he gets the game time his attributes will rocket as he still has so much potential.

I cannot foresee me making any more signings (apart from potentially Alex Smithies joining from Huddersfield Town) with only departures in mind. I cannot see Bojan, Ted Smith and Dominic Poleon still being at the club come the end of the transfer window. All players are worth a bit of money so it will be good to garner some cash for the club.

some great transfers there man, they'll stand you in good stead for the forthcoming campaign

New to the story but great work man, could you tell me what year you're currently in?

2015-02-16 15:09#208167 TodayAtTomorrow : some great transfers there man, they'll stand you in good stead for the forthcoming campaign

I really do hope they come good, especially Adryan and Wilson who could go a long way to keeping us in the Premier League.

2015-02-16 16:03#208176 dannysenior : New to the story but great work man, could you tell me what year you're currently in?

Welcome and thanks for giving the story a read. I am currently in 2019...a long way behind other FMScouter's I'm sure.

In terms of expectations for this season, I do think that avoiding relegation has to be the target and anything above that will be seen as an amazing achievement. The domestic cup competitions are not important; I am not interested in a cup run so the defeat against Leyton Orient has already been moved on from. That result is already irrelevant and will have absolutely no impact on the players’ morale or future results. If anything, not being in the Capital One Cup will only benefit the lads as they will not have as many games to take part in compared to other teams who will surely be in and around the relegation zone with us. When the FA Cup comes around, we will of course look to win in the magical third round but we won’t be looking to go as far as we did last season. The only priority we have got is to hit that forty point mark which is seen as the mark you need to achieve if you are going to avoid a relegation battle at the end of the season.

Overall I am quite pleased with the start we have made in the Premier League. The win against QPR was fully deserved and a momentary lapse of concentration against Southampton helped them grab a late equaliser. Four points in our first two games is more than respectable and definitely not expected. Can we be the club to defy expectations and do well in our first season in the Premier League? Out of all the promoted clubs, we have the best chance of this as we possess the better quality of player. What we are lacking is squad harmony due to an on-going dispute between myself and Dominic Poleon.

Poleon was instrumental in getting us promoted from Sky Bet League One but he rarely featured in our Championship winning season. Instead he spent a lot of time injured and when he was match fit, he wasn’t used as I had preferred options that were doing a good job. Over preseason, which went very well but I won’t bore you with the details, he has moaned and moaned about not getting match time and he has realised he is very unlikely to feature in the squad at all this coming season, purely because of his crap attitude! He has been told who the boss is and that he can sit and try and find game time in the Under 18’s. The result of this definitive message to him is that others have not liked the way I went about attempting to resolve the issue. Poleon is still going to be sent to train with the Under 18’s and put on the unwanted list. The sooner he is out of the club, the sooner the squad harmony will improve which will only be a good thing for the club in what will be a difficult season.

Player of the Month – Adryan

a good start to the month against some very tricky sides...unfortunate that you've got a dissenter in the ranks, but hopefully you'll sort him out and be able to kick on.

Another great quality update as usual man, keep it up!

Great signings with Alberto, Adryan and espacially Wilson!

Good start to the Season and losing in the cup isn't that bad. Now you can concentrate on the League for the next few weeks