Season Fixtures
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[Redacted] was absolutely shocked, he felt the bitter taste of defeat after coming so close to beating Auckland City, but just missed out by one penalty. That one goddamn penalty that could've given Waitakere a much needed pre-season! Sean Lovemore the only one to miss the mark in the first penalty of the shootout that ended 4-5 taken.
[Redacted] huddled the team around in the cold, dry 10C Breeze of a New Zealand afternoon and gave them the talk that the performance wasn't so bad as much as unlucky, but still, he felt sick. He didn't need a home defeat against one of the biggest rivals in the league, it wasn't a good indicator of the coming days and by God, if he had to spend another year in this $#!thole, well, "upset" would be an understatement for him.
That day he wasn't particularly happy, so he headed to the bar all alone, drink away the pain of the day, he wasn't feeling particularly good that day and he certainly needed not a loss against one of the club's bitter rivals.
The whole time [Redacted] at the bar, a few groups of Auckland diehards were at their tables, having their drinks to a recorded replay of the game being shown at the bar. This angered , but he stayed there, at the bar, on his stool, drinking away. His 2nd, his 3rd, his 4th, and his 5th. The whole time he was being taunted every so often by a random, slightly drunk fan of Auckland sitting at his table with his mates, constantly hearing taunts throughout the night like "Oi! What a shit manager you are!" and "Waitakere, eh? What an utter shite club!".
As the clock ticked, he was growing pessimistic. What if he never realises the dream of winning all Champions' Leagues and the World Cup? What if he is stuck in New Zealand for a long time, maybe his entire career? Or worse - What if he had to manage AUCKLAND? Sure, they're a decent club with decent finances, but their attitude is awful and they were just the spoiled rich kids of the league, much like their fans.
Then he realized, he was growing feelings for Waitakere, maybe Waitakere wasn't just a stepping stone for him. After all, their first club managed is always a fond memory for most managers. He was starting to love Waitakere, and hating their rivals.
In the background of [Redacted] deep thoughts, the insults and taunts were coming thicker and faster, the Auckland fans wanted to make him the laughing stock of the room, some of them shouting things like "Whipping boys!" and "3rd place fodder!"
Finally, one man had the audacity to walk up to [Redacted] stool And say "Oi, you, ye wanker! Put that alcohol down and pick up the pencil and paper and jot down some decent fucking tactics so you don't get ass-whipped as hard as you did the last few times we kicked your sorry fucking ass!"
Then he slapped [Redacted] .
The whole of the pub starts laughing, [Redacted] is infuriated. He gets up from his stool and flips that bastard off, before starting a brawl with the bastard, punches, locking hands and kicks, a lawless fight.
Pub workers are just as intrigued as the spectators and don't even think about calling authorities.
[Redacted] was growing tired a few minutes into it, noticeably he was weakened, the other man was too, but not as much. Finally, a group of Waitakere fans who happened to be at the pub intervened, helping [redacted] floor his opponent. As the man lay on the hardwood floor of the bar, the Waitakere boss utilised his boot to make the disrespectful Auckland fan bleed from the head, before stomping him in the stomach. He takes a swig out of the whiskey bottle he ordered and says "Whipping boys, eh? We'll see how you like it next season when you languish in second, you and your team of bastards!", and then pours the remaining alcohol left in the bottle on the now panting man's head wound.
As the man screams and pants harder, very visibly in pain, the gaffer walks nonchalantly to pay his bill, and calmly walks out the bar, taking a taxi home. He tells the driver his address, before passing out.
Tactics
The next morning, [redacted] stumbles out of his bed in his villa in the quiet, suburban part of Waitakere, he's forgotten about last night, but the headache is still there.
After lazily rolling in his bed for a few hours with his iPad, he decides to get some fresh air to ease up the hangover. As soon as he leaves his house, he is suddenly bombarded by the media camping out outside his house with no less than 7 journalists and reporters lining up to ask him about matters more, err... "on the pitch"
they either didn't notice or didn't care about the pub brawl, which was good, because [Redacted] has already had enough trouble as it stood.
Mr. [Redacted] , groggy from his hangover, goes "Oh for fuck's sake! Piss off! I haven't got time for you stinkin' reporters!"
They begged "Please! Just a few questions regarding tactics for next season".
The Manager sighs "Fine, but make it quick"
The Christchruch Daily: So, last season saw you go with a 4-5-1, a classic 4-4-2 sometimes switching to a 4-2-2-2, and a "total football" 2-2-1-2-3 formation which was attacking and very fluid in it's style, but that seemed to have been only a moderate success, but against Auckland you seemed to play a different formation, can you tell us more?
[Redacted] : Well, what I played was a 5-3-2 based formations with 3 CB's, one of which plays as a limited defender, and 2 wingbacks who prefer a more attacking role, an anchor man, 2 central midfielders and 2 strikers, as for the other 2 formations, I don't reckon I'll be doing much more with them.
The Waitakere Report: Well, that didn't work against Auckland, how do you expect it to work in other games?
[Redacted] : Well, it is experimental, I won't lie, but I believe we put in a decent shift against Auckland, I can't pretend the loss hasn't hurt us, but it did show the formation was sound at both ends, we were just a bit unlucky with the end product.
The Auckland Times: Final question: Do you think you might get crowded out in midfield or leave too much of a gap between attack and midfield?
[Redacted] : No, I am certain of it that I will e to keep enough men behind the ball and in midfield, the gap between attack and midfield is solved by playing one midfielder in a supporting role, and then there are those 2 wingbacks bombing up the line to assist with playmaking down the wing.
SCREENSHOTS OF FORMATIONS:
4-4-2:
4-5-1:
5-3-2:
Current Squad]
Added Challenges
+ Added Challenge: No downloaded tactics. Slightly "inspired" tactics are allowed, but no downloading tactics allowed.
+Added Challenge: No loading up England: Only real men don't load up England.
So you know the drill, I'll be back at the end of the season to assess the season (As it is a fairly short one)
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This aging striker was bought from East Coast Bayes in a different but non-connected league in New Zealand (don't ask, NZ's league systems are weird). He doesn't have much fuel left in him and is, in fact, set to retire after this season, but looking at his stats, he'll do well for one season. (STRENGTH IN DEPTH!)
A good, fairly young left back who can play RB and LWB if called upon. Nice stats all around the board and decent speed on the lad but I think it'll be fair to say that he will be mostly utilised defensively
