The Luke Henderson Story

#116 - Stenhousewho?

12/03/2041 -- The play-offs are secured (although, not official yet), which is a remarkable achievement already. I didn’t expect it at all before the start of the season to be honest. But the thing is, when you are battling for the second spot in the league and we are just missing it by a couple of points (which is possible) I have some kind of a strange feeling about it. I should be happy because of we reached into the play-offs, but missing direct promotion doesn’t felt great either. Well, it’s all speculating right now because of there are nine more matches needed to be played, but something is bothering me. Something that is called Stenhousemuir.

Our performances in the month January weren’t that great, wherefor we lost the connection a bit for the second spot in the league, but luckily we recovered ourselves in February with five wins in a row currently and still counting. As a result we are approaching the second spot again, mostly because of all the other clubs underneath us are dropping points frequently as well. But there is one exception. Stenhousemuir. Were did those guys come from? Week after week after week they are winning, winning and winning. It’s just insane. Actually it’s irritating me heavily at this point. Maybe you know the feeling that your frustration is growing year after year and at the end it creates some kind of a grudge against a particular team because you are always struggling with them, their striker is always scoring against you, or whatsoever that might be irritating.

I reached this point because of Stenhousemuir. I mean, why are they suddenly so good this season? They were predicted for finishing seventeenth in the league, their wage spending is the second lowest from all teams with their financial situation being insecure as well, they never did better than the eleventh position in the league over the last two decades and on top of that, they have a very small squad size. Apparently their players are some kind of immune for having injuries. To be honest, they have a couple of very decent players (I looked at every player in their squad in detail, I was just curious how good they actually are), especially if you take in count their best paid player is receiving only £650 per week. But even then, it’s ridiculous they are winning so many games.

Although we have a game in hand I have some kind of a bad feeling about the outcome. Their schedule isn’t the toughest one anymore until the end of the season, with us needed to play against difficult opponents like Livingston and Cowdenbeath, both away as well. Our only way out is possibly the home game against Stenhousemuir itself in the second last playing round of the season, but they have won the first leg earlier this season with 2-0 already. So we need to do better because of the goal difference isn’t counting, the results against each other are dominating if we are ending with the exact same amount of points. At the other hand, I don’t know if we are ready for the Premiership yet. I think only two or three players are good enough, but the rest of the squad definitely not. That’s another problem: we don’t know how this season is going to end and therefor I can’t sign players in advance for next season already. Although it will be fun to see how Stenhousemuir will be smashed week after week in the Premiership next season if they handled to finish second!

Well, we shall see how it will end. As already said, finishing third will be some kind of disappointingly to me, especially if Stenhousemuir is finishing second. I don’t have any experience with the play-offs in Scotland yet, but I guess it will be very hard for winning it. The form of the day will be very important and of course not having too many injured key players. From now on I will end this season in one straight run, so the next header will probably explain to you how it all sorted out!

We can only cross our fingers and hope that Stenhousemuir lose their momentum and you can take advantage... It's certainly going to be a closely fought race for second!

Second is still a real possibility with a game in hand yet to play. At some point they will lose some form, it's up to you to then keep yours going to secure the second automatic spot.

You have the advantage over Stenhousemir. 27th Aprill will be a date for the diary!

Unreal to be in the position you are in, especially after such a short time in charge (again)

#117 - Why can it never ever be comfortable? Just for once…

19/05/2041 -- The very last seconds are ticking away. The season is over, we screwed everything in the last few playing rounds and now we have to play a couple of very difficult games in the end of the season promotion play-offs. For the very last time my goalkeeper lumped the ball ahead in the 90+4th minute of the game, Stenhousemuir is probably celebrating their promotion already. The ball hits the ground before one of my midfielders controls it. He lumped the ball ahead again, straight into the box. It seems Finn Watt is offside. The referee blows his whistle. Everything is done. 1-1. No second place in the league and thus no promotion. Although, that was what I thought in the first place. But he didn’t whistle for the end of the game. No! He was pointing his finger to the penalty spot. What the fuck! What is going on over here. Seriously. It was offside in the first place, but now the ball is lying at the penalty spot. This can’t be true. I’m dreaming. I can’t even remember myself the last time we scored a late winner in the additional time. It must be years ago, somewhere whilst at Tottenham.

This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Central defender Oliver Farmer, who has just recovered from an injury, is standing behind the ball. He scored six out of the seven penalties this season. But this time it’s a man-to-man fight with the best goalkeeper in the league this season. Oh game, don’t do this to me! This can be the most devastating anti-climax I have ever had since I’m playing Football Manager or it will be the most exciting moment since a very long time. Oliver Farmer is waiting for the referees whistle, the crowd is silenced, only Stenhousemuir is hoping that it will go horribly wrong. Farmer starts to run, he hits the ball powerful, the goalkeeper is waiting until the ball is shot, the ball is definitely not well placed in the corner. But the keeper is going down and the ball is a couple of feet from the ground. He sticks his hand in the air, but it’s not helping him. Farmer just has scored the 90+4th winner! After the kick-off was done the referee blows immediately once more. The last whistle today. We have done it! The crowd exploded, I ran down on the pitch immediately and everybody was turning completely crazy! We just realized our ticket into the Scottish Premiership for the very first time in the clubs history. It’s an absolutely outstanding performance. I never expected this already in my second season. It’s just insane.







Poor Stenhousemuir! Their manager was hoping that Alloa Athletic did their sportive job (and to be honest, they are the bigger club who have participated in the Premiership for many years over the last decade), but he wasn’t counting on this referee who made a terrible mistake. I laughed my ass off for sure! Stenhousemuir was driving me crazy all the way to the end. Even in the match against them in the second last playing round. We were the better team for sure, but for some reason they managed to score two goals after a counter-attack… Of course they handled to win their last difficulty away game very easily, and with us playing a draw they are ending second. But after a long while the luck is finally with me again!

But the biggest challenge is just started to begin from now on. How for god sake are we going to avoid relegation next season! I don’t want to think about it yet. First I have to decide which players will be staying next seasons and for which positions we need an upgrade. First my goalkeepers. Scott Findlay did a good job this season, but I’m not really sure if he is good enough for being my starting goalkeeper next season as well. I think I’m going to search for a better one, but that will be difficult for sure. Fraser is not good enough; if we can sign a new goalkeeper he will be sold or dropped down in our B-squad.

Defensively we bought two really solid centre backs last summer, and both of them are staying for sure. I think both Farmer and Beckley are good enough for being my starting players at Premiership level, although I will search for possible upgrades of course! The full-back positions are a bit of a concern. I’m always struggling with this two positions in my whole career. They are always performing bad in the tactics I use. Even at Spurs, when I could buy some world-class players for this position. Now I have to deal with even more worse versions of Jan Kromkamp for instance. Forde never looked really solid and will return to Crystal Palace. Scott Munro is running out of his contract and will leave the club. On the left hand side Jamie Gray did slightly better, but it wasn’t very convincingly either. Rodgers, Potts and Mahood are not good enough for Premiership football obvious, but their contracts are not ending yet, so it might be possible we keep them as reserve players because of we can’t renew the complete squad as a whole within only one summer.



Our central midfielders then. Gregg Smith performed surprisingly well this season. He was supposed to be a reserve player, but when I had to make use of him in the very first weeks of the season because of some injuries, he did really well. So I kept using him, which lasted all the way till the end. He crowned himself even as the best player with taking care for a good amount of assists and some goals as well. But we are not seeing him back next season. His contract is ending and I don’t believe he will be good enough for participating in the squad at the highest level of Scottish football. Also Calum Matthews’ contract is ending. He fulfilled his role as a reserve player with dignity, but he isn’t good enough either for staying with us. The contracts of Hamilton, Spence and Lennon are lasting for another season, but they are all probably not good enough to become a starting player next season. Lennon is actually pretty terrible, I will try to sell him. Spence and Hamilton might be useful as a reserve player for next season, but the season thereafter they are probably leaving us anyway.

Our attacking wingers did a good job. Especially Adam Jeffries was a great catch! He was just amazing in the second half of the season. I think I can say he brought us direct promotion all by himself. Already a couple of weeks before the season was ending I made Stoke City an offer for hiring him one more year. I ‘m pretty sure he can be very important again on Premiership level. Stoke City accepted it, so our first guy on loan (out of the maximum of four) for next season is already secured. Barry Murray and Christopher McKinlay performed very decent last season, so I will keep both of them. Barry Murray was one of the very few players who ran out of his contract and who I offered a new deal. John Loy is not good enough, even for Championship level he is doubtful, I barely made use of him. He is running out of his contract, so that’s an easy call.

The guys up front performed pretty well. All of them scored a good amount of goals. But we are not seeing all of them back next season. Gielty crowned himself as the clubs top goal scorer, but I think he is just a little bit to average for Premiership level. It’s not because of he is a great striker that Hearts is loaning him out, isn’t it? John Reid functioned as a fourth choice already who is definitely not good enough for the highest tier of football in Scotland. His contract isn’t ending yet, so he will dropped back into the B-squad next season if we can’t sell him. Finn Watt and Jim Johnson are staying, but I think they are only good enough for being a solid back-up striker next season. We need some fresh blood over here for sure.

So, all summarized we are going further with between eleven and thirteen of the current players, the precise amount of them depends a bit how many new guys we can attract next season. There lies a huge task in front of us now. With a vey low amount of money we have to assemble a squad which can avoid relegation next season. I’m pretty sure already we have the lowest amount of wage money spending by far in comparison with all other Premiership sides, so I need to make advance of my name for sure. That’s the only way to attract some decent players who are an upgrade for us. Now we have forced promotion we can take a look at the transfer market for guys who are running out of their contract first, I’m glad that I didn’t signed new players already at this point, otherwise they were probably not good enough!






Note: It was close for sure Scott, but the coin flipped in the right direction, although it lasted till the very last second of the season! Their drop of form didn't happened at all TheLFCFan, but the couple of points they lost were just enough for us at the end. Well, it wasn't our best match Justice. If we did win that one our second place was secured already, but yeah, this game seems to like it pushing you all the way to the edge of the cliffs! There isn't much difference in level between most of the teams in this league Griffo, so with a couple of good signings you can perform amazingly better then the season before. Although the biggest challenge is just started to begin from now on!

YES! What a moment for the football club, for yourself and for Oliver Farmer! Congratulations.

PROMOTION! HOORAH! Luke Henderson is back on the horse!

Congrats with the promotion mate!

Jan Kromkamp, that's a blast from the past! Congratulations on promotion, excellent job!

Massive congratulations my friend, terrific!

#118 - English Invasion

02/08/2041 -- After a couple of days of celebrating and partying we are down on earth again. But we didn’t celebrate this title all by ourself! Last time I forgot to say that Hearts have won the Premiership title! For the very first time they have broken the Rangers and Celtic hegemony since 1985, now precisely 56(!) years ago, when legendary manager Sir Alex Ferguson has won the league title with Aberdeen. An absolute wonderful performance from my former employer, which isn’t our affiliated club any longer by the way, because we are competing in the same league now. The next step in Spartans history is started to begin. Our big search for new players who are capable for playing in the Scottish Premiership. And so we did. The pre-season period is done right now, the very first league match will be played tomorrow. But unfortunately our squad isn’t complete yet. It’s really tough to find good players who fit into our wage budget and do not cost us that much (although I prefer free agents of course). Before I present the new signings until now I will show the pre-season results first.



I didn’t noticed that we don’t have to play in the group stage of the League Cup (which I even re-designed by myself in the editor, so I should have known that) so I start playing quite early and that’s why I played a lot more practicing games then I used too. But, it’s some kind of a benefit at the same time to get the new players familiar with the slightly changed tactic. I’m playing a little bit more cautious in comparison with last season and I don’t make use of attacking wingers anymore (although I can shift them easily further up front if needed). I think we need a little bit more security in our style of play. Until now it looks solid and it was getting better week after week, also because of the new guys were slightly coming in. As you can seen our start of the season will be pretty hard! First we have to play against Rangers and in the third playing round we are facing Celtic... I think we need to prepare ourselves for having a terrible start of the season, but the last thing we should do is panicking after those first few matches went lost.





Fresh blood
In the very first place I searched for free agents. It’s the easiest way to attract new players without spending that much. At the end I found two players. The first one being Will Walker-Nightingale. Difficult strange name, but a very decent player for sure. Although his finishing isn’t that high, he proved himself over the last few seasons whilst on loan at a variety of clubs on different levels in the English football pyramid. He scored a good amount of goals throughout the seasons. We have to wait if he can do the same at Premiership level, but if he doesn’t we can use him as an attacking winger as well. His overall skills are very decent, so he is an upgrade for sure. The second free signing is called Mike Kelly-Evans, our new right full-back (although he has to learn this position just a little bit better, because he is useless to me as a centre back, which he is naturally). Probably he will be terrible again in terms of his average score at the end of the season, but his attributes are much better than the guy we had on loan last season. His physical and mental skills are pretty good and technically his main attributes are double figures. I’m pleased with him, and seen his current value he is one of the better players in the squad.





The very first signing we had to pay for this summer might be recognizable. We had him on loan last season from Hearts and I decide to buy him, despite the fact he is not so tall… Jamie Gray is a young talented left full-back who wasn’t playing that great last season, but it’s the best we could get. At least we need a guy for this position because Rodgers and Potts (who were already at Spartans when I re-joined the club) are just shit. If Gray can develop himself a little bit more he is a decent player for us to survive the few first years in this league. He is our only Scottish signing between all Englishmen as well. One of those new Englishmen is a new goalkeeper. I doubted heavily between two choices, but Kareem Grant took the benefit for his length (1,92 meter against 1,81 for the other guy I was interested in). The other guy was a very good line-goalkeeper, but Grant is far more better in the air. And because I don’t like tiny goalkeepers Grant was the best choice obvious. He is an upgrade all way round in comparison with Findlay for sure, who will become my back-up goalkeeper now. Fraser is send back into the B-squad because no other club wants to buy him.





The last guy we signed so far is a legend already. I never expected we could sign such a good player, just like Beckley last season. Actually we loaned him in, but I’m really pleased anyway. Let me introduce you David Griffiths-Trevor, our 18-year old central midfielder from Liverpool. He is an absolute monster. He already played two matches in the Premier League for them last season but apparently he can’t account for much playing time next season. I think he is a very good player for every bottom-half side in the Premier League and the big clubs like Rangers and Celtic in our league, but he wants to join Spartans! Again a signing because of me I think. He is ten times as good as all other midfielders we currently have together and he might be the key to avoid relegation. I’m utterly pleased with this deal as you can imagine! Hopefully he doesn’t get injured…



Five signings until now. Not as much I was hoping for at this point, but the transfer window is open for another month from now on. I’m allowed to sign two more guys on loan (which I will only do if those guys are a real upgrade) and we have a little bit of transfer money left in the bank because I sold a couple of future transfer clauses from the past and a couple of players might be leaving us in the next month as well. One of our youngsters is wanted by some clubs and I don’t see it in him at all. I can use the money to add some more squad depth in the first place, because the current squad size of only nineteen players is way to less. So actually it’s not that bad we have to play against the giants already. We are going to lose this matches anyway, so it’s better facing them now rather than when our squad is complete!


Note: Thanks guys for all of your support! it was an absolute amazing achievement for sure. And at least one or maybe even two years earlier then I expected. But a new challenge is immediataly in front of us; make sure we are not getting relegated immediately! After this Griffiths-Trevor signing I have some good expectations now it might be possible. Coming up next: our very first run of games at the highest level of football in Scotland.

This is going to be a massive challenge but one that I'm sure you're looking forward to.

#119 - I couldn’t wish more!

19/10/2041 -- The transfer window is closed, we have spend every available coin for trying to get the maximum out of this season and the first eight matches in the league are played already. The very first conclusion for acting on the highest level of Scottish football is pretty clear: we couldn’t do any better. Okay, we could have 24 points instead of 11 of course, but he, you need to be realistic as well guys! Beating Celtic is a remarkable achievement already!

You are right. We have beat Celtic. It’s just insane. And it wasn’t even undeserved! We were the better team for ninety minutes long, although we needed a penalty to grab the 3 points. We created a couple of very good chances, but their goalkeeper made some miracle saves he probably didn’t even noticed. Three times he deflected the ball just enough where after it hits the woodwork three times as well. He was really lucky all the time, but had no answer for Farmer’s penalty kick. It were our very first points of the season after we got smashed at Ibrox and lost a bit unlucky against Saint Mirren at our own place. After the Celtic game the results were quite changeable, but that will happen all season long I guess. Although the win against Hamilton away is another impressive performance I would say. It’s still a very rich club as it was before when at Hearts, but all those years they didn’t achieve anything! Oil money isn’t always the key to success apparently. If we go on like this we might collecting enough points for sure to avoid relegation, but we need cautious, a couple of bad results and we are eighteenth again. The golden rule is to gain a 1-point average out of every match, which will be enough to survive in 98% of the cases. So yeah, so far so good I guess!






More transfers
As already mentioned last time our squad depth isn’t good enough yet, but in the last month of the transfer window we succeed to complete the job. In the first place I sold one of my youngsters for around £175,000 and one guy who was written off already (Lennon) for another £40,000. Together with some transfer clauses I sold I have a little bit more room for buying players who are on a decent level already and able to pay their wages. This allowed me to buy Hichem Toual. Beside Jeffries we didn’t have a decent back-up left-midfielder, so that was the main priority for me. It was a bit difficult because there was barely a good player available. Toual isn’t really great either for this amount of money, but it was my only chance. Anything better than some free agents or right-footed guys who are not helping us any further. So Toual has to do the job for us if Jeffries is tired, injured or lacks form.



Beside of Toual I signed two more guys on loan. As already said before I'm only signing guys on loan who are an upgrade in comparison with the players we already have rather than using them as a back-up player. Mainly because we can only hiring four players at maximum. I think we succeed with both of them, although Goodwin has to fight himself into the squad first because of Beckley and Farmer are doing well. Although he can play as a right full-back as well. Which is a huge benefit, because we don’t have a decent back-up player if Kelly-Evans is getting injured or tired. Goodwin is very tall, solid physically, mentally quite good (maybe he has to learn some better positioning) and technically not necessarily weaker than Farmer or Beckley. He is coming over from Manchester United till the end of the season.

Our last signing is another big catch beside of Griffiths-Trevor. We are loaning in 18-year old Mike Williamson from Brighton & Hove Albion. A striker who is very usable as an attacking winger as well because of his pace, fantastic dribble and decent crossing. I’m very delighted again with this guy. I mean, he is a very good player for Rangers or Celtic as well! Mentally he needs to improve a little bit more, but he is still young and can become one of the better strikers all over Europe if he is developing himself. At that point we had 21 players in the first squad, not that much, but I prefer to have quality instead of quantity. To give myself a little bit more possibilities for rotating I moved our best youth talent (Ali Watt) into the squad. It might be possible he isn’t playing that much, but having only 21 players is just a little bit to less I think. If possible I will make him available for the B-squad as well so it isn’t affecting his development that much. Although he probably isn’t good enough to become an instant squad member in the future, but we need to focus ourselves for the short term in the first place, which is avoiding relegation. Whatever it takes.







All summarized I’m really pleased with the transfers we did. It’s a bit sad we couldn’t sign more Scottish guys, but the better players are already at the big clubs yet, so it’s quite hard to find and sign good Scottish players. I will fix it for sure when we become a more solid club in this league within a few years from now on (hopefully!). Short terms policy is ruling right now, it doesn’t really matter how we get there, we just have to make sure we will get there! Underneath I have shown the transfer overview from this summer together with the full players list who needs the job to be done.

Wow. That's an amazing victory and in your first season too. It certainly won't be forgotten!

A 21-man squad is quite light, but it should just about do the job and you are a disadvantage financially compared to a lot of clubs in the division of course.