Glory Hunter - A Journeyman adventure

Interesting change to Notts Co. The playoffs will be tough but I reckon you have enough steel and experience about you this time to get the result you want!

On the field


Finally! 3 years of trying and we finally win a play-off and we now find ourselves back in league football. I started 3 years ago in the Vanarama South and now i am in League two. What a club move and what a final two games of the season as i finally vanquished the play-off demons to get myself into league football.

Halifax were a team we had not beaten since the start of the game so getting paired against them was a worst possible result but in the end the semi-final was a tight turgid affait with Tom Crawford scoring for the first time in months, heading home from a free kick to put us in the final once again. There it was Cambridge, a side we had the better off in our own personal duels but who were leaps and bounds above us in terms of points as the season ended.

I kind of felt it was going to be our final as our keeper saved their penalty just 2 minutes in and a Declan Dunn and Enzio Boldewijn goal gave us the 2-0 win despite going down to 10 men. The play-off who-do is finally gone as i now find myself in League 2.


The team of the year pretty much names itself with Regan Booty being the fans player of the year and in some ways i cant deny. Perhaps not the most flashy of players like Boldewijn and Uche but he was by far the most consistent player for us in the center of midfield.


So now back to League football and we have a very nice budget indeed. It is another £30k odd in wages and with a few reserve players being let go as they were costing far too much. As i said in previous updates, we need a rebuild and the £500k odd in spending moeny will allow us just to do that. This is a project and to be honest we could, with the right players find ourselves in a play-off fight again ( I mean i love a play-off fight so why not).

Our first team is honestly good enough, we just dont have options should anyone get injured or suspended anad so the money will be spent buying or loaning in players who can make us have options. The future is bright, the future is Notts County

Onwards and upwards

At last! A victory in the Play-Offs. Time to get this club firmly back on its feet.

Congratulations! County are back in the Football League.

Excellent work to get that promotion and to finally be in the football league! A lovely budget there that could certainly beef out this squad and potentially see some sort of run next year once again!

Season 3 in game has been done and lets have a look at the wider football world. The Premier league saw Man Utd win the league again whilst adding an FA cup with a sweet victory over rivals Man City.

Real Madrid continued their poor performances as Barcelona took the La Liga title with rivals Atletico winning the Copa del ray on penalties beating Valencia. Juventus were toppled for the first time in years as Napoli became the champions of Italy and it was more heartbreak for them as Inter won the Coppa Italia final

It was a great year for PSG as they regained their status as Champions of France but also became Champions of Europe for the first time beating Liverpool 3-2 in the final. They couldn't win the Coupe de France though as Lille won that Cup competition.

Another side struggling is Bayern Munich who once again failed to win the League title with Bayer Leverkusen being crowned of Germany with Schalke winning the DFB Pokal beating Leverkusen in the final

Meanwhile the other European competitions saw a strong turnout for the English sides as Chelsea beat Arsenal in the Europa League 1-0 whilst Everton win the first ever Europa Conference beating Wolfsberger 1-0

Our Progress


Career

2019/20: Oxford City, 6th Vanarama South, 4th Qualifying Round FA Cup, 3rd Qualifying Round FA Trophy
2020/21: Oxford City, 3rd Vanarama South, 2nd Round FA Cup, 1st Round FA Trophy, Vanarama South Manager of the year
2021/22: Notts County, 3rd Vanarama National (Promoted via Play-offs), 3rd Round FA Cup, Semi Final FA Trophy

Past Clubs Performance

So Oxford City, couldn't make it into the play-offs for a 3rd year straight just missing out on goal difference with an 8th place finish. Not bad considering i took two of their best players.

So here i am about to embark on my fourth season on the save and my first full season at Notts County. Most importantly it is also our first season back in the Football League after a 3 year exodus. As you have seen we were given a nice little budget to work with but our pre-season prediction was to finish a lowly 22nd and we are expected to be in the relegation dog fight. So what did we do to stop that happening?

Transfers

Now i said at some point last season there was actually a larger project than i initially had expected that needed to happen at the club and the pre-season was my first chance to make the changes we needed to do. A total of 22 players left the club on free transfers (1 retired but who counts) as we shaved a fortune off the wage bill and also stripped our U18's down to mainly players who could have a future here. Some of the players that left were former Oxford City man Josh Ashby, back up striker Remaye Campbell as well as Veterans Jim O'Brien and Matt Tootle.

We have also loaned out 5 more players to Non-League clubs to allow them to get some much needed game time but none of them were likely to feature this season.


So now onto the real action and that was the incoming moves where we saw 8 new players join the club for a total cost of £71k. We added a whole new backline to compete with the first choice back line that was the best defence in the Vanarama National. Yohan Bilingi was the first man in who joined on a free transfer having been here last season on loan from Bristol City.

He will compete with Brindley at right back and keeps us having two very strong options. In the centre of the park we have gone for pure youth as regens Danny Bowerman and Russell Allen both join on free transfers having joined from Liverpool and Queen's Park respectively. Bowerman is a tower of a man who needs some work on his tackling and heading but his decent all-round physicals and decent positioning and decision making gives me hope he can turn into a solid player. However, Allen is the far better prospect with strong tackling and defensive stats. Physicals are not quite as good as Bowerman but are not far off and at 17 years of age he has the time on his side to keep improving. Both will be swapped with Betts and Bird as we go through a gruelling campaign that includes 3 cup competitions alongside a long league campaign. At left back it is a more familiar face as Zeki Fryers joins from recently relegated Swindon (Who are now in the Conference). Formerly a Premiership players with Palace and Spurs he has good experience and some allround stats and is likely to be our starter at left back thid season.

It wasn't just defenders we bought as we added Northern Ireland U21 International Ethan Galbraith on loan from Brentford for the season to be an upgrade on Tom Crawford as the Mezzala whilst Frenchman Ousmane Fane joins as competition for Mitch Rose (Danny Rose's brother in case you were wondering) as a ball winner. Fane is limited but very high bravery, work rate, stamina and tackling stats means he should have the energy to get around the park. Galbraith has lots of stamina, a good first touch and also a surprisingly good tackling ability meaning i might even make him more of a box to box but we now have a lot more options in the midfield. An area we sometimes lacked when fatigue kicked in.

Out on the wing we added in Norwich's Aiden Fitzpatrick who has strong dribbling and crossing abilities and will be a capable back up to Boldewijn

The big signing of the window (well the one that cost money) was Dan N'Lundulu who joins from Southampton in a £71k deal. He played one game in the Premiership last season and scored in it and i think he has some great potential. Sure his finishing could be higher but again he has decent physicals and fits our pressing forward mentality meaning Raul Uche has some real competition for once up top.


The moves have meant our pre-season prediction is up to 13th and now we are being expected to get into a mid table position. The board are still wanting us to fight against Relegation but personally i want to get into that Top half so it can be either a great springboard for a promotion push next season or the performance to get me into my next job.

How have i done? Who is your favourite signing?

Good work over the summer. Personally, I'm looking forward to how Galbraith fairs.

With the season starting a little earlier due to the World cup in Qatar it was time to see how we could fare in League 2. It is fair to say i wasn't quite expecting this


We have been largely rampant in the league scoring goals for fun (19) whilst also maintaining the best defence in the League (Conceding just 5). We are just looking like a really good team right now as things are clicking all over the patch. New signing Dan N'Lundulu is leading the League with goals with 7 to his name already whilst Dutchman Enzio Boldewijn is on 5 for the season.

A 0-0 draw started our League season against a strong Scunthorpe side but it was then 4 wins on the bounce in the league as we beat Exeter (3-1), Gillingham (6-1), Plymouth (2-1) and Aldershot (4-0) as we largely ripped through teams. A battling 2-2 draw with Carlisle where we came back from behind twice halted the end of wins but a 2-0 win over Southend has pushed us into 2nd spot in the League. Now looking at the table, it could also be a fortunate that we have seemingly played a lot of the teams who are struggling but i guess we will see if we are the real deal as we take on fellow unbeaten side Fleetwood in our next game.

It hasn't just been the League where we have largely performed well. In the Carabao Cup, the 1st round draw saw us paired with Nottingham Forest at home. What a tie! A local derby and a great game for us, despite going down to 10 men in the 22nd minute (Enzio Boldewijn petulantly kicking a player). We went 1-0 down but Zeki Fryers was an unlikely hero scoring an equaliser on his debut to send the tie to Penalties. Sam Slocombe was the hero saving two penalties to send us to the 2nd Round. There we had a nice tie against fellow League 2 side Crewe but in our one misstep we lost the game 1-0 preventing us from getting to face League 1 side Salford in the 3rd Round.

However, we didnt have long until we faced Salford as they were in our Leasing.com/ Checkatrade/ Johnstones Paint or whatever it is called nowadays Cup group. We took on the League 1 side and a 2-1 victory was ours. Next up we have Accrington and Norwich U23 side to finish off the Group stage.

Off the field we added in Wolves Chinese International winger and the Brilliantly named David Wang on loan for 5 months as both Coley and Charles picked up injuries leaving us a little short on the left wing.

A great month and relegation is already looking a distant thought. Lets see if we can carry this on

Excellent start to life back in the Football League!

Wow, what a start to life in League 2. N'Lundulu proving his worth early on and it seems life the defense is doing their job too, with very little being conceded. Going to be a massive test against Fleetwood but one that will tell you a lot.

I think you can only be delighted with the results on the pitch. The growth at the football club has been first-class. Keep it up.

The run of good form had to end at somepoint and September has seen a little stutter but we are still undefeated as we picked up 4 draws followed by a scrappy 2-1 victory in the final game of the season.


We are still very much in contention in a surprise play-off spot. Our 1-1 draw against fellow high flyers Fleetwood showed some real grit as Boldewijn gave us the lead mid way through the 2nd half before we got pegged back. The Wycombe and Wrexham games were two of the dullest 0-0's i had ever seen on FM before we had our first real slip up against Rochdale. 2-0 up and cruising we let the 2 goal lead go and ended up with just a point.

Moving on to the final game of the season we needed a penalty and a very late Aiden Fitzgerald goal to give us our only win of the season and to keep us in the top 3 of the league.

Things are going well here but a big change is on the horizon....

A decent month all-in-all when you consider your opposition and where they stand in the league table. Although dropping points in the fashion you did against Rochdale is incredibly frustrating.

What could this big change be...

So sorry for the radio silence guys but Work kind of took over for a bit. However, i should be back a little bit more regularly over the next few weeks at least. So to kick-start a new era of posting, i thought it would be best to let you know that i had made another move as i join League 1 side MK Dons in the hopes of kickstarting their season.


Even though things were going well at Notts County, the chance to jump up a league couldn't be missed. The Club were expected to finish around the play-offs but i actually find them in a relegation fight. It is almost the exact same position i found Notts County just 12 months ago and i am confident i can get this side back into the play-offs and possibly even into the Championship.

The board are only expecting a mid table finish this season but as you can see from the Club Vision they are an ambitious lot as they also seek the Championship in the near future. I have £1m to spend for January as i look to add to what is an adequate but unexiciting squad. Our best players are ones on loan with young regens Dan Davdison and Matt West being our two best outfielders. Lee Nicholls is a solid pair of hands in goal and is also the club captain. In front of him we have veteran Italian International Angelo Ogbonna at the heart of our defence.

For now, i am going to stick to a similar style of football that served me at Notts County whilst i work out exactly what we need but do expect a busy January window as i reshape this side to my will.

Project Milton Keynes is the name of the game