Career Mr.Manager takes on the PL Second Chances Challenge

[mcandrew003]

Good good, I'll be prowling the site expecting it 

[Mr.Manager]

Season 4

 

Highest division for second chance teams:

Premier League: 28

Championship: 14

League 1: 5

 

We started the season with Blackpool, but the aim was to get over to a new second chance team as soon as possible. And by the end of June, a two time European Champion came a-calling:

 

 

The Club: Nottingham Forest FC

 

The Pedigree: Forest had a topsy turvy time in the Premier League in the 90s, being relegated three times but also finishing 3rd in the 1994/95 season and qualifying for the UEFA Cup. With players such as Stuart Pearce, Bryan Roy and Stan Collymore, they were always an entertaining club and have been sorely missed since they last departed the top flight, back in 1999/00.

 

In the inaugural Premier League season, Forest were relegated in what turned out to be Brian Clough's last season in charge. They had had an incredible time of it with Ol' Big Head prior to that though, culminating with winning consecutive European Cups in 1979 and 1980. With two trophies, they have won it as many times as Juventus, and more times than Borussia Dortmund, Chelsea or Atletico Madrid to name a few.

 

 

So, with an expectant board demanding promotion, I got stuck right in to the Forest job.

 

The first thing I noticed with the squad I had inherited was a huge number of left backs. I generally like to have two players for every position, which meant that here I had 4 more left backs than I wanted. 4!

 

 

Intriguingly, when I went to the team report, I was sagely advised that we were weakest in midfield. The identified solutions? More left backs!

 

 

Could this be a bug?

 

Our one and only mission for the season was to gain promotion. Somewhere along the line, however, we accidently won the EFL Cup.

 

 

Woops!

 

The good times continued to roll and by mid-March we were all but up.

 

 

With that, I started looking for a new job to take on. There wasn't much that caught my eye, until I saw Bradford floundering in League 1:

 

 

I put my name forward which didn't please the board.

 

 

But was shunned in favour of Stuart McCall. Charming!

 

 

Elsewhere

 

Manchester United won the league again, which meant that for the first time this career we didn't have a new Premier League winner.

 

Reading stormed to the Championship title, finishing well clear of my Forest side in second place. Sheffield Wednesday were victorious in the play offs, giving me a trio of names to tick off our second chance list.

 

Less pleasingly, Portsmouth got a nosebleed after finding themselves as high up as League 1 and swiftly wait straight back down to the safety of the fourth tier.

 

Spoiler

(I forgot to take screenshots of the leagues, sorry guys!)

 

 

Spoiler

Aston Villa, Barnsley, Birmingham City, Blackburn Rovers, Blackpool, Bolton Wanderers, Bradford City, Cardiff City, Charlton Athletic, Coventry City, Derby County, Fulham, Ipswich Town, Leeds United, Newcastle United, Norwich City, Nottingham Forest, Oldham Athletic, Portsmouth, QPR, Reading, Sheffield United, Sheffield Wednesday, Swindon Town, Wigan Athletic, Wimbledon, Wolves

 

 

Thanks for reading, all comments welcome!

 

[mcandrew003]

2 updates in a day! I must be dreaming 

Another brilliant season mate, we all have accidents some times, shame you tripped and landed on the EFL Cup....  I think the previous manager was very reliant on the left side of the pitch

Looking forward to the next one mate! 

[BatiGoal]

Doing great! Forest are one of the teams I need to manage one day. Going with Leeds myself now and are also a club with a fine history.

Btw, got some top class Left Back recommendations, let me know if you need any 

[Mr.Manager]

23 hours ago, mcandrew003 said:

2 updates in a day! I must be dreaming 

Another brilliant season mate, we all have accidents some times, shame you tripped and landed on the EFL Cup....  I think the previous manager was very reliant on the left side of the pitch

Looking forward to the next one mate!

Haha you are too kind!

 

Thanks mate. I genuinely rotated for every cup game but for some reason we found ourselves in the final... I have seen some lopsided teams in my time but that was just overkill!

[Mr.Manager]

22 hours ago, BatiGoal said:

Doing great! Forest are one of the teams I need to manage one day. Going with Leeds myself now and are also a club with a fine history.

Btw, got some top class Left Back recommendations, let me know if you need any 

Thanks BG. Yeah, it is great to pick up these sleeping giants and restoring them to glory. Good luck with Leeds.

Haha, I have left backs coming out of my ears!

[Mr.Manager]

Season 5

 

Highest division for second chance teams:

Premier League: 31

Championship: 11

League 1: 5

 

For the second season in a row, we began the year wanting to jump ship. Unfortunately, the opportunity just would not arise this time around, with only a few minnow clubs looking for a manager:

 

 

Dulwich Hamlet haven't played in the Premier League have they…?

 

In the meantime, I was left to half-heartedly continue my work at Forest. One thing of note is that we were hit with a big tax bill, although it didn't seem to make any difference to our funds:

 

 

Our form was generally patchy as I wasn't too interested, although we did achieve a club record win in Europe:

 

 

Finally, in late October, a Lancashire giant found themselves in need of a manager…

 

 

The Club: Bolton Wanderers FC

 

The Pedigree: Bolton are a real Premier League club, having competed in 13 of the 25 seasons since the league was formed. Although they made the odd appearance in the 90s, the 00s were Bolton's time to shine; when a squad built by the one and only Big Sam sent shockwaves through British football. Jay-Jay Okocha was one of the most entertaining players the league has ever seen, and the Trotters could also count World Cup winner Youri Djorkaeff and Champions League winners Fernando Hierro and Ivan Campo amongst their ranks.

 

Further back in to the recesses of time, Bolton were the pride of Lancashire. They won the FA Cup three times in the 1920s, and were also victors against Matt Busby's decimated Manchester United side in the emotional 1958 final.

 

 

Before accepting the job, I made my sneakiest move yet. In my last piece of business as Forest manager, I bid a whopping £35m on a Bolton youngster. The lad did have potential, but I won't pretend it was a fair deal!

 

 

I took over at Bolton with the club in a sorry state. After 16 games the club had yet to win the league, and were already 7 points from safety.

 

 

It took a few more weeks, but in late November we picked up our first league win of the season over fellow strugglers Bristol City.

 

 

After that we put together a decent run of results, including a decent win over Premier League opponents in the FA Cup…

 

 

…But unfortunately we left ourselves with far too much to do to secure a playoff spot. For the first time in this career, I wouldn't be celebrating promotion.

 

In my 30 league games in charge, we picked up 55 points. Over a full season that would have been enough to see us finish third, and so hopefully only minor changes will be needed to win the league next year.

 

Elsewhere

 

Stefano Pioli's Manchester United won the league again (Mourinho was sacked a few seasons ago), and they are proving to be a real force in this career.

 

We were only able to scratch one new team off our list this season, as QPR finished runners up in the Championship.

 

Lower down the leagues there was a disaster as Ipswich and Wigan both suffered relegation to the fourth tier.

 

It looks like I might have to go about this challenge differently if I'm going to see those League 2 stragglers work their way back to the top.

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

Spoiler

Aston Villa, Barnsley, Birmingham City, Blackburn Rovers, Blackpool, Bolton Wanderers, Bradford City, Cardiff City, Charlton Athletic, Coventry City, Derby County, Fulham, Ipswich Town, Leeds United, Newcastle United, Norwich City, Nottingham Forest, Oldham Athletic, Portsmouth, QPR,Reading, Sheffield United, Sheffield Wednesday, Swindon Town, Wigan Athletic, Wimbledon, Wolves

 

 

Thanks for reading, all comments welcome!

 

 

[mcandrew003]

Getting there mate! Must have really needed that lad if you bid 35 Million 

Shame Blackpool went down, but I'm predicting promotion next year for you and your Bolton side

Good work mate, keep it up!

[BatiGoal]

I gotta get a club hopping challenge after my current one. Really seems fun and you're making good progress. Keep 'em up

[Mr.Manager]

38 minutes ago, mcandrew003 said:

Getting there mate! Must have really needed that lad if you bid 35 Million 

Shame Blackpool went down, but I'm predicting promotion next year for you and your Bolton side

Good work mate, keep it up!

Haha! He's actually developing really well at Forest - he's worth £11.5m now...

Thanks mate. The aim is to secure promotion nice and early so I can start looking for jobs as soon as.

added 0 minutes later

19 minutes ago, BatiGoal said:

I gotta get a club hopping challenge after my current one. Really seems fun and you're making good progress. Keep 'em up

Haha, they are really good fun! Not quite as involving as the in-depth individual challenges too.

[Ashez]

Wow, really smashing out the updates mate! Congrats with Blackpool and Forest, I'm sure you'll get Bolton crossed off next year! 

[Mr.Manager]

16 hours ago, Ashez said:

Wow, really smashing out the updates mate! Congrats with Blackpool and Forest, I'm sure you'll get Bolton crossed off next year!

Haha! I had a bit of a backlog of seasons that needed writing up, so I thought i'd smash them all out quite quickly. We're up to date now so it'll slow down a fair bit.

[Mr.Manager]

Season 6

 

Highest division for second chance teams:

Premier League: 32

Championship: 11

League 1: 4

 

Last season was a bit of a disappointment as far as this challenge goes. Promotion for QPR meant that a 12th different second chance team had returned to the Premier League, but two other clubs slipped down to League 2. Portsmouth, Ipswich and Wigan are all in the fourth tier of English football now, and we need to stop the rot.

 

Encouraged by @Batigoal 's suggestion of player exchanges, I set about trying to gift those fallen giants some decent players.

 

 

In the end, 4 players went to Wigan, 2 to Ipswich and 1 more to Portsmouth. Fingers crossed that will help them all climb the divisions again.

 

Back in Lancashire, our Bolton side looked to build on the momentum that we had built last season.

 

Our first game was a fine 6-1 victory over Brighton…

 

 

And we never really looked back from there, having a comfortable cushion at the top all season. By mid Feb, I felt that we were safe enough to begin looking for new work:

 

 

Although nothing came available until after we had wrapped up the league.

 

 

Finally, in May, a news item caught my eye.

 

 

Fulham - themselves a second chance team who had already found their way back to the top flight - had poached Coventry City's manager. Perfect!

 

 

The Club: Coventry City FC

 

The Pedigree: Coventry were one of the founder members of the Premier League and remained a top flight team until they finally succumbed to relegation in 2001. Although most seasons involved a relegation scrap, there was also a lot of flair in those 90s teams, with the likes of Dion Dublin and Gary McAllister, and later Robbie Keane, Craig Bellamy and Darren Huckerby bringing real pedigree to the squad. They have had a rocky time of it since but here's hoping they can get rid of their terrible current owners and find their way back to the top sometime soon.

 

Although Coventry enjoyed 34 consecutive years in the top flight prior to that 2001 relegation, their history is mostly one of suffering rather than success. Aside from the obvious high point of the FA Cup win back in 1987, Coventry haven't even finished in the top six of any league for 47 years. Ouch!

 

 

 

Just like I had when I moved to Forest to Bolton, I decided to give myself a little parting gift before I moved to the Midlands. £2.7m and a nifty winger in exchange for a 17 year old centre back. Suits me.

 

 

By the time I arrived the season had already finished and so I will have a full preseason to work on getting Coventry back up the ladder.

 

Elsewhere

 

Manchester City were Premier League champions this year. It wasn't the first time and so nothing to shout about there.

 

Blackpool were relegated for the second season in a row and there's a nice bit of symmetry to their league journey so far: League 2, League 1, Championship, Premier League, Premier League, Championship, League 1...

 

Hull and Leicester joined Bolton as the promoted teams. For the second season in a row, only one new Second Chance team has been promoted - we're really slowing down now...

 

On a happier note, my meddling with the League 2 teams saw both Ipswich and Portsmouth earn promotion. Wigan finished 10th so if I can help them any more this summer they should have a shot at escaping the bottom tier.

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

Spoiler

Aston Villa, Barnsley, Birmingham City, Blackburn Rovers, Blackpool, Bolton Wanderers, Bradford City, Cardiff City, Charlton Athletic, Coventry City, Derby County, Fulham, Ipswich Town, Leeds United, Newcastle United, Norwich City, Nottingham Forest, Oldham Athletic, Portsmouth, QPR,Reading, Sheffield United, Sheffield Wednesday, Swindon Town, Wigan Athletic, Wimbledon, Wolves

 

 

Thanks for reading, all comments welcome!

[Ashez]

This is going very smoothly! Really enjoying this concept and save mate  

[Mr.Manager]

Season 7

 

Highest division for second chance teams:

Premier League: 33

Championship: 11

League 1: 3

 

And so on to another season.

 

I'll be honest, there's not a lot to report from this one. We stormed to the league title, building up a nice 30 point lead by mid-February.

 

 

As before, I began to deliberately lose my games to the Second Chance teams - case in point, this defeat to Swindon…

 

 

But, ultimately, that's just one game in their long season, and I don't think the points I gifted made any difference to any of them really…

 

 

The only other thing I picked up on was the weird points system in the Checkatrade Trophy

 

 

Swindon: two games, two draws, three points… Eh? Bristol, 2 games, 1 defeat, 1 point. What?!

 

Elsewhere

 

I think the size of this job is finally beginning to dawn on me…

 

For the first time, we had no new second chance teams in the Premier League.

 

Worse, Sheffield United and Wigan both narrowly missed out on automatic promotion to the Championship and League 1 respectively. And even worserer, Oldham, Swindon and Portsmouth all got themselves relegated.

 

Oh dear oh dear.

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

Spoiler

Aston Villa, Barnsley, Birmingham City, Blackburn Rovers, Blackpool, Bolton Wanderers, Bradford City, Cardiff City, Charlton Athletic, Coventry City, Derby County, Fulham, Ipswich Town, Leeds United, Newcastle United, Norwich City, Nottingham Forest, Oldham Athletic, Portsmouth, QPR,Reading, Sheffield United, Sheffield Wednesday, Swindon Town, Wigan Athletic, Wimbledon, Wolves

 

 

Thanks for reading, all comments welcome!

 

[Mr.Manager]

1 hour ago, Ashez said:

This is going very smoothly! Really enjoying this concept and save mate

Thanks Ashez! Although I am worried it's slowing down a little bit, I need a boost of two or three teams getting promoted at the same time...

[BatiGoal]

The deeper you get into the career the slower the progress. Good to know you managed to strengthen a few other teams along the way, will pay off eventually. Keep hacking away mate.

[Mr.Manager]

49 minutes ago, BatiGoal said:

The deeper you get into the career the slower the progress. Good to know you managed to strengthen a few other teams along the way, will pay off eventually. Keep hacking away mate.

Absolutely. At the minute it feels like for every one team I get up the ladder, two more fall down... Cheers though mate, I know I'll get there!

[mcandrew003]

Fantastic work mate, really getting them up there now! This is going to be interesting to see how you do next year! KIU

[Scratch]

Wow, I only just caught up with this and it's epic! But...

You need to get a whole heap sneakier! When you left Bolton you should have gutted the team and player exchanged the whole team to Portsmouth and other low lying friends. When you've finished at Coventry, you should do the same. Heck you should probably get a top Premiership job next and redistribute as much of that team as low down as the players will accept. 

So many possibilities. Can't wait to see what happens next!

[Mr.Manager]

15 minutes ago, scratch99 said:

Wow, I only just caught up with this and it's epic! But...

You need to get a whole heap sneakier! When you left Bolton you should have gutted the team and player exchanged the whole team to Portsmouth and other low lying friends. When you've finished at Coventry, you should do the same. Heck you should probably get a top Premiership job next and redistribute as much of that team as low down as the players will accept.

So many possibilities. Can't wait to see what happens next!

Haha I would that I could! Unfortunately, you can't player exchange every player...

I'm actually not entirely sure what the criteria is for players eligible for player exchange. It does seem to be players that are out of favour. Players that are transfer listed or offered out are sometimes up for it but not always. Even stranger, some teams seem to be able to take more players than others.

I'm still learning a fair amount about how to manipulate the game though, really interesting!

[Scratch]

23 hours ago, Mr.Manager said:

Haha I would that I could! Unfortunately, you can't player exchange every player...

I'm actually not entirely sure what the criteria is for players eligible for player exchange. It does seem to be players that are out of favour. Players that are transfer listed or offered out are sometimes up for it but not always. Even stranger, some teams seem to be able to take more players than others.

I'm still learning a fair amount about how to manipulate the game though, really interesting!

Ah, fair enough. I know it depends if the other team wants the player, but I was presuming lower down clubs would all want the better players. Maybe some of them have salaries that are too high or something.. I guess you could always release all the players the board will allow you too, but that has limits too.... 

Hmm. Now I really want to try this! I just have to complete another 18 seasons first...

[Mr.Manager]

Season 8

 

Highest division for second chance teams:

Premier League: 33

Championship: 11

League 1: 3

 

Unlike last season, season 8 was action packed. Let's get stuck in.

 

First things first, I was hit with another surprise tax bill at the beginning of the season.

 

 

That's the second time that this has occurred in this career - it was earlier with Forest. I'm not sure why it happens, or even what impact it has. I seemed to have the same amount of money available…

 

As I set about strengthening my squad, I had a few bidding wars to deal with. I do have a little tip for these, just in case it helps any of you.

 

Say you really want a player, but you are trapped in a bidding cycle that is driving the price of the player far above what you'd like to pay. Outbid your opponents to win the auction. At the player contract stage, cancel the transfer. Then bid again at the desired lower price, and, more often than not, you will no longer have to compete with other clubs for the signature!

 

 

I'm sure plenty of you already do that, but I think it's quite neat.

 

Anyway, things were bumbling along nicely with Coventry...

 

 

When I spied a new opportunity come available.

 

 

Although promotion was far from secured with Coventry, I figured an 11 point lead over second place should be enough to see them promoted. So I jumped ship.

 

 

The Club: Wigan Athletic FC

 

The Pedigree: Wigan are arguably the least likely team to have played in the Premier League. From a town dominated by rugby and with the powerhouse clubs of Manchester and Liverpool in close proximity, the club was slow to get going. It hadn't even competed in the football league until 1978. But, remarkably, the club found themselves promoted to the top table in 2005.

 

And there they stayed, enjoying an outstanding 8 season residency in the top flight. The club managed to finish in 10th place in their debut season, and, although that remains their best ever finish, they still provided plenty to cherish for their fans. Players such as Leighton Baines and Antonio Valencia have since become Premier League heroes, but it was at Wigan where they got their break. Even Wigan's relegation season was remarkable, as they won the FA Cup three days before being sent down.

 

 

You know the drill now, just before moving to a new club I splurge all my old club's money on one of their worst players. Enter Dorian Dervite, a £6.2m (+ player exchange + sell on percentage), 35 year old central defender…

 

 

Wigan were already going well in the league and, even better, all three automatic promotion spots were taken up by second chance teams.

 

 

The rest of the season involved a nice procession to the title, and good progress is being made.

 

Elsewhere

 

The Premier League title was won by Manchester United this year (for a change). That's 7 out of 8 seasons that we have had Mancunian champions.

 

Coventry hung on to win the Championship title. Just about. The 11 point gap that I left them was reduced to just one! Blackburn joined them through the playoffs, ticking another two teams off our list.

 

Swindon joined us in promotion to League 1, although Portsmouth just missed out.

 

All in all, a good season.

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

Spoiler

Aston Villa, Barnsley, Birmingham City, Blackburn Rovers, Blackpool, Bolton Wanderers, Bradford City, Cardiff City, Charlton Athletic, Coventry City, Derby County, Fulham, Ipswich Town, Leeds United, Newcastle United, Norwich City, Nottingham Forest, Oldham Athletic, Portsmouth, QPR, Reading, Sheffield United, Sheffield Wednesday, Swindon Town, Wigan Athletic, Wimbledon, Wolves

 

 

Thanks for reading, all comments welcome!

[mcandrew003]

A great season mate, managing to get 2 clubs promoted in the same season is a fantastic achievement and will really help for the run in! Will Ben interesting to see how you fare in the next few years, can't wait 

[Scratch]

Bold move to leave Coventry at that point, but fortune favours the bold! Great stuff.

Shame about Portsmouth though - they really won't take the hint will they?

[BatiGoal]

I quite like Wigan for some reason. They played ballsy football under Martinez and they were a tough team to beat on their better days.

Great progress mate!

[Mr.Manager]

On ‎28‎/‎04‎/‎2017 at 07:57, mcandrew003 said:

A great season mate, managing to get 2 clubs promoted in the same season is a fantastic achievement and will really help for the run in! Will Ben interesting to see how you fare in the next few years, can't wait 

Thanks mate! Definitely useful to see other teams getting promoted without my help, should shorten the process a lot. Thanks for your continuing enthusiasm!

[Mr.Manager]

On ‎28‎/‎04‎/‎2017 at 09:38, scratch99 said:

Bold move to leave Coventry at that point, but fortune favours the bold! Great stuff.

Shame about Portsmouth though - they really won't take the hint will they?

Yeah, I've found it difficult to know how early to leave teams... It's always a gamble but if you've set the squad up well they should be able to do it on their own... right?

Haha, they are a real thorn in my side at the minute!

[Mr.Manager]

On ‎28‎/‎04‎/‎2017 at 15:53, BatiGoal said:

I quite like Wigan for some reason. They played ballsy football under Martinez and they were a tough team to beat on their better days.

Great progress mate!

It's been great to relive the glory days of some of these clubs! Wigan were brilliantly unpredictable. I think one year they lost to Spurs 8-0 away but then beat them 1-0 at home...

[Mr.Manager]

Season 9

 

Highest division for second chance teams:

Premier League: 35

Championship: 9

League 1: 3

 

Season 9 began with my Wigan team competing in League 1 and so there was not much chance of me directly influencing a second chance team's return to the Premier League.

 

Because of that, I decided to have a nice easy season this year. I left the other second chance teams to their own devices and just focussed on having the most successful Wigan season possible.

 

And that went quite well!

The league was wrapped up nice and early

Although we were quickly dispatched in the League Cup, we went all the way in the Checkatrade trophy:

 

 

As for the FA Cup, well, we were hoping for a miracle against City…

 

 

…We had to be at our best to beat Arsenal…

 

 

But unfortunately we couldn't produce it again in the final…

 

 

Adding insult to injury, those first two scorers were players that I knew well…

 

 

Still, not bad going for a League 1 side!

 

Elsewhere

 

Manchester United were again the Premier League champions. This is an amazing spell of dominance for the Manchester clubs.

 

They'll both find themselves returning to The Valley next year, as Charlton Athletic secured promotion to the top flight.

 

My Wigan side romped to the League 1 title, smashing the points record previously set by my old Blackpool team. Joining us in promotion to the Championship were Sheffield United.

 

Down at the bottom, Ipswich and Portsmouth traded places in Leagues 1 and 2. Seems I'll need to head down to help those two out sooner or later.

 

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

 

Spoiler

Aston Villa, Barnsley, Birmingham City, Blackburn Rovers, Blackpool, Bolton Wanderers, Bradford City, Cardiff City, Charlton Athletic, Coventry City, Derby County, Fulham, Ipswich Town, Leeds United, Newcastle United, Norwich City, Nottingham Forest, Oldham Athletic, Portsmouth, QPR, Reading, Sheffield United, Sheffield Wednesday, Swindon Town, Wigan Athletic, Wimbledon, Wolves

 

 

Thanks for reading, all comments welcome!