Lotto FC: A Lottery Winner's Adventure

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This is my first attempt at a Manager's Story. I've been a fan of your forums for a little while now and I've followed some of the stories with a real sense of urgency, logging in daily to feed on the newest updates. With all this creative talent around, it wasn't going to be long before I was inspired to try my hand at my own story....and here it is!

First things first, let me give you a quick run down on how my game is being played.
I'm playing in FM Classic mode, with an edited database (for reasons which will become apparent as you read on). I'm not any sort of FM God, and I haven't edited all my players to be uber football legends, so you can expect a fair number of losses in my results!

I've tried my hand at making some very amateur graphics, I'll try and improve them as we go along...unless some of you artistic legends can outdo my meagre efforts of course!

Any and all feedback is appreciated....and above all things...have a good time reading my story!

Lottery Winner buys lower league club!
17 July 2012

Euromillions jackpot winner, Jay Zambo has secretly purchased and taken over a lower league football club. The FA announced today, that the club previously named as Truro, will now be renamed as "Lotto FC" and relocated to Milton Keynes.

Zambo has worked behind the scenes to secure his takeover bid, completely buying out all the previous members of the board and assuming complete ownership of the club. Sky Sports understands that Zambo has already secured a new 10000 seater stadium in Milton Keynes, where the club will be relocating to.

Zambo has been busy, clearing the club's previous debts and injecting £2 million pounds in to the club's coffers. It has been rumoured that Zambo will not be investing any more funds in to the club and he intends to make sure the club is able to turn a profit for itself in order to be self-sufficient and fund it's own growth.

Lotto FC will play their games in the Blue Square Bet South league, taking over where Truro FC left off. There have been no rumours of any players or staff members leaving or joining the club at this stage, but we understand that Zambo intends to fully take control of the club himself, dispensing of the previous manager's services immediately so that he can fill the vacant manager's position himself.


Will Lotto FC become the Man City of the lower leagues? Only time will tell...

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The First Press Conference

Jay Zambo: "Alright, I want to start off by thanking everyone for joining us today at what will be the first, but I'm certain not the last Press Conference at our new Camelot Arena football ground. Let's take some questions..."

Russell Barder: "Morning Mr. Zambo, I'm Russell from the Milton Keynes Citizen...my first question is about what prompted the relocation to our city?"

Zambo: "The club has big aspirations Russell. We don't intend to remain languishing in the lower leagues for long and we need to have a stadium and the infrastructure in place to support our aspirations. We couldn't get planning permissions for a new stadium in Cornwall, and let's be honest...if we manage to make it to the dizzy heights of the Premier League, how would we manage to move thirty thousand supporters in and around Cornwall to come and see our matches? Moving to Milton Keynes allows us a better opporunity to grow as there is already a substantial travel network in place and they are used to hosting bigger matches with being the home of the MK Dons"

Rob Beasley: "Morning, I'm Rob with The Sun. Simple question from me, are you going to continue bankrolling the club until they reach success?"

Zambo: "Simple answer to that one, Rob. No. I've made a considerable investment in the club already and I'm looking at this as a business venture. I have a good team of financial experts on board and our intention is to allow the club to become self-sufficient. We want the club to generate enough income to be able to fund it's own growth. I won't just be pouring my lottery winnings in to the club...the wife wouldn't let me!"

Georgie Bingham: "Georgie, from Sky Sports. The club has been stuck in the relegation zone recently, what are your aspirations for the new season? And how do you hope to meet those aspirations?"

Zambo: "Well Georgie, I think the club can do much better than it has been doing that's for sure. I met with the other members of the staff today and let them know that I intend to aim for a top half finish this season. We've agreed that I'll have a £100,000 transfer kitty to play with and a reasonable wage budget. I think I should be able to turn the team around with bankrupting us already that's for sure!"

Steve McManaman: "Steve with ESPN. Not exactly football related, but what's the silliest thing you've bought with your winnings so far?"

Zambo: "Apart from this club you mean? Ha, I'm not sure yet...although I'm sure some of you will be slating my transfers in the coming weeks...so maybe you'll be able to make up your own minds then? Anyway, thank you all for your time, I look forward to the next time we meet!"

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Liking the idea. Good luck.

God, Milton Keynes stealing another club! Nice story man, keep it up.

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First things first, I knew that I would have to get to grips with the playing staff. My backroom team had been busy hiring a whole team of new, unknown and untested players for the squad. All of the Truro FC first team had decided that they'd rather take their chances on the Free Agents list than stick around in what they saw as an unethical venture, so they all agreed terminations on their contracts.

I had agreed to give myself a transfer kitty of around £180,000 to spend and a wage budget of almost £12,000 per week. With this sort of money I knew I could be very competitive in the transfer market, but I needed to have a clearer picture of where the money would be best spent.

I let my Assistant Manager take a few training drills so that I could compile a comprehensive report on each player in the team.


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It was clear that the backroom team had worked their socks off trying to secure as much talent to the roster in the off season, but there were gaping holes in all the keys areas of the team...most noticably in the striker position! I had decided that I wanted to go with some variation of a 4-4-2 for my tactics, so my main targets would have to be some strikers, some centre midfielders and one or two defenders to improve / cover the existing talent pool.

Very good start m8
I will be following, good luck

I like the idea, will definitely be following. Good luck

Nice idea and a good start. Good luck!

Just a quick one: I wasn't happy with the previous format and the fact that I forgot to change the edited team its (so they were playing in Truro's kit!!).

Because of that I restarted with a new edit, most things are the same, but I've created some new badge / icon graphics and revamped the banners for the topic. I've also binned the Truro team and let the game auto generate some players for my team.

If you fancy it, re-read the previous posts, a little bit has changed and hopefully improved!

Further updates to come!

Lotto FC V United Truro FC ends in violence.

20 July 2012

A pre-season friendly match between Lotto FC and United Truro FC was cancelled today amidst scenes of extreme violence and clashes between highly charged groups of supporters from both sides.

In a move to try and unite the seperated fanbase, club officials had arranged a match between the newly formed United Truro FC and the newly re-branded Lotto FC. Lotto FC, previously known as Truro FC were bought and taken over by the new manager and previous Euro Millions jackpot winner, Jay Zambo in a move that angered a large section of die hard fans at the club. The new owner and boss decided to relocate the club to Milton Keynes, prompting a large group of fans to form together and form their own club, United Truro FC, that they say is the true continuation of the club's lineage.


The match today was meant as a way to unite the two seperate groups of fans and try to alleivate some of the anomosity between the two groups, but just fifteen minutes in to the game, officials were forced to cancel the match as the crowd began to turn on each other and police vans, full of officers decked out in riot gear had to be deployed to bring the violence to and end.

Club officials and players on both sides called for a calm between the two groups and welcomed open conversation between the fans, Lotto FC owner and manager Jay Zambo tweeted: "This is far from the beautiful game I thought I had signed up to be a part of".

The FA confirmed that they were investigating the incident and would announce shortly whether or not either of the clubs would face any sanctions as a result of the violence.

Transfers

I decided that I'd be foolish to fritter away my transfer budget on trying to actually pay for players, so I adjusted my budget to give me a wage budget of around £15,000 per week, an increase of almost 50% to the budget!

(Free) I had no strikers in the squad, so it was fairly obvious that this was an area that needed investment. With a fairly decent burst of speed and a high finishing rating, I'm hoping that Traynor will bag a few goals over the course of the season.

(Free) Again, another striker to add to the squad. Poor physical stats, but decent technical stats. I'm hoping Danny will excel as a DLF.

(Free) A decent looking BWM to hopefully bolster the defence and help us play some more compact and tight football. Good Teamwork / Work Rate, coupled with high Tackling should make Hinds a huge success in this role!

(Free) A great addition to the squad at centreback. Butcher will go straight in to the first team and provide the sort of defensive strength we're going to need to pull through this season unscathed!

(Free) A versatile player that will add great cover to the squad, being adept at playing both LB and DM. Lacking in physical stats, but a great array of technical stats to draw on will hopefully be enough to to bolster the team!

(Free) Another versatile player that will cover a range of positions in the team. The stats are not the greatest, but he offers cover in an area where I would otherwise be very short of cover.

(Free) Another striker, bringing the total to three in the squad. Stevens will mainly feature as a back up to the other two, but at only 22 years old, there's hopefully some room for improvement and maybe he can break in to the first team eventually?

(Free) Another squad player, will offer some cover to our RB position. Harvey will play as a Rotation player as and when other players need a rest.

(Free) A great addition to our midfield, a hugely talented, young, CM who will hopefully provide the creative impetus we need to make and create goal scoring opportunities. Lynch is probably the signing I'm most proud of at this early stage.

(Free Agent) Sadly, I couldn't convince Owen to re-sign a new contract with the club, so he leaves as a free agent. There are no clubs interested in signing him, so I guess he's moved off to start a new career as an adult performer....who knows?!?



Brackley v Lotto FC
A disappointing draw against a team we should probably have beaten. All in all, I'm not too concerned as there have been a whole host of new transfers in and a change in terms of tactics, the players will need some time to settle in and adapt.

Lotto FC v Woking
A good result against a team a whole league higher than us in the standings. Woking scored the first goal, but we kept the pressure on throughout the match before finally breaking our duck from a corner towards the end of the game. We were unlucky not to have scored more and probably should have won the match as Woking made ver few chances themselves.

Lotto FC v Tranmere
A great result against a team a whole three divisions higher up than us. They fielded an almost full strength team, but they couldn't break down our defences. We sustained a lot of early pressure, but as the game went on, we made a few decent chances, but failed to capitalise on them properly.

Hendon v Lotto FC
A poor result. Our first loss against a team that we should have destroyed. In the end, we had over 20 attempts on target including 3 clear cut chances. Our strikers should have done better and they will definitely have to improve on their finishing before the start of the season.


All in all, a mixed bag of results. Some good draws against possibly stronger teams, but two matches that we should have won went begging owing to our lack of efficiency in front of goal. The strikers will have to work much harder if we're to meet my heady expectations of a Top Half Finish this season.

Next Up: The season kicks off!

Not sure if anyone's following this or not, lol, but there will be another update shortly! (If I don't get sidetracked by the Arsenal v Man City game.)

2013-01-13 14:22#76953 JayZambo : Not sure if anyone's following this or not, lol, but there will be another update shortly! (If I don't get sidetracked by the Arsenal v Man City game.)

Don't mention that, I'm nervous enough already!