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Post by Boony on Oct 19, 2006 9:15:29 GMT
A wonder strike from Tom Bonner on the stroke of 90 minutes won the Eagles a pulsating play-off final at Chippenham and a place in Conference South next year.This is how the Beds on Sunday reported the moment that I, as a Bedfordian born and bred, had been dreaming about for years. Most famous for being one of the FA Cup's giant killers of the 1950s and 60s, with wins against Newcastle (2-1 R3 1964), Watford (3-2 R2 1955), Norwich (4-2 R1 1956) and Oxford (1-0 R2r 1966), Bedford Town FC has never really been a big-time club. Typical of a town who advertise themselves as "being on the Oxford - Cambridge arc", their finest moment is arguably almost beating Arsenal in a 1956 FA Cup third round replay. Four minutes from winning the game, they eventually lost 2-1 in extra time. A quiet period followed, most notable for the club employing Barry Fry as manager in the late 1970s. Then, having failed to win the Southern League Midland Division in 1981 on goal difference, the club disbanded in 1982 after plans for a new ground had fallen through. I wasn't yet three years old, and so I was never given the opportunity to support my local team as a lad. The nearest club at the time was Luton Town, so Manchester United naturally took my heart. This was confirmed with a breathtaking European Cup Winners Cup victory against Barcelona in 1991. Later that year, on the back of a supporters' group campaign, the local council allowed a reformed Bedford Town FC to play games in the local park, and they entered the South Midlands League Division One. A string of promotions (1993, 1994, 1995, 1999 and 2001), and a new ground built in 1993 and subsequently upgraded to meet various league rules, paved the way to last season's climax, a 25 yard strike from Tom Bonner "good enough to have won any game at any level." *** The Nationwide Football Conference South. The Big Time. Playable in Football Manager for the first time, I decided that this was my destiny. I could have applied for the job in real life, but I was certain they'd have laughed at a Finance Gimp with no footballing qualifications at all (I'm not sure the title of CotD winner 2003, 2006 would be enough). After all, manager Nick Platnauer had done a decent job do get the club promoted, and the board would probably only get rid of him for someone of more experience and expertise. Not someone like me. So there was only one thing for it. Spend £30 in GAME and let the computer aid me in playing out my fantasy. That's right, kids, this is the story of a computer game. A game in which I take over the reins at Bedford Town FC at the start of the 2006-07 season. All events in this story did not happen in real life. Any resemblance between the characters herein and real persons living or otherwise is purely coincidental. Actually, I guess that bit depends on how good the SpInG researchers are...
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Post by Mr Bismarck's Electric Donkey on Oct 19, 2006 10:03:56 GMT
Good luck Mr Boo. Let us know how the game feels as well as your results, so I can decide exactly how tempted I am to give SpInG more money for old rope.
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Post by Moo on Oct 19, 2006 10:08:02 GMT
Nice work, Boo. No get on with winning the Conference South. No pressure, like....
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Post by Boony on Oct 19, 2006 10:10:30 GMT
Cheers guys. I'll try my best, on both counts.
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Post by Sonic on Oct 20, 2006 5:10:51 GMT
paved the way to last season's climax, a 25 yard strike from Tom Bonner "good enough to have won any game at any level." Are you sure he was not just playing hte field and decided he needed a new calling card?
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Post by Boony on Oct 20, 2006 8:03:17 GMT
paved the way to last season's climax, a 25 yard strike from Tom Bonner "good enough to have won any game at any level." Are you sure he was not just playing hte field and decided he needed a new calling card? As it turns out he's not in our squad this year - he was a defender on loan from Northampton...
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Post by Boony on Oct 20, 2006 8:03:32 GMT
July 2006
First impressions count for a lot, I've heard, so it was with a beady eye that I took in my initial views at Bedford Town FC. I spent a while looking around the place, checking out the players, staff, facilities, and finances, and I must admit that my thoughts were fairly positive. But then I stopped admiring the FM07 user interface and started looking at the actual facts and figures, and things started to look a little more bleak.
I suppose I shouldn't be too harsh, as this lot have only just gained promotion to the Conference South, but there's rather a long list of attributes that we lack. Pace, height, strength, skills, depth, money and experience. On that first day, there were a total of 31 players on our payroll, including the grand total of one right back (16 years old) and one player in his footballing prime (between the ages of 26 and 33). There is literally no transfer budget, although we are usefully £1.5k under our £5k per week wage budget.
In my first days at the club, one young midfielder caused me to laugh out loud when he picked up a thigh strain while miskicking a ball during training. I did wonder, at this point, what I had let myself in for.
During the course of July, I signed up six "greys" (players who haven't yet signed a contract with us, there to fill up the numbers) to add a bit of depth and some much-needed skills to the squad. It says something that four of these players are looking to command a regular place in our first team this season. I also persuaded our 40 year old defender Mike Ford (ex-Oxford, among others) to sign up as a player/coach, increasing our coaching staff to three. We also have one scout, and I assume there's a physio or two kicking around somewhere.
This is about the limit of our transfer activity at the moment, as our scout has come up with nothing so far, and we don't have any money to pay compensation to clubs to get their coaches from the job centre. I would like to set up some loan signings, and I attempted to enlist a parent club, but the board told me there was "no point" in contemplating this just yet. Thinking about it, though, I may well have asked to enlist a feeder club by mistake - I might have been a little drunk and tired by this point. I shall endeavour to check and correct if necessary.
We played six friendlies, the results of which I'm not too bothered about as these games are really just exercises in squad fitness and getting players time on the pitch. However, after a 3-0 drubbing at Chippenham (aye, the team we beat in last year's playoff final), I was happy when we only conceded 4 goals in the next 5 games. Unfortunately, we could only find the net in one of them, beating Conference North side Hucknall, 3-0. The other four games (against York, Chelmsford, Darlington and Hednesford) were all 1-0 defeats, but the encouraging thing is a fairly tight defence. I just need to work out how to get this lot to score goals. Tricky, with no pace nor height up front.
Tactically, we're having to play quite a short passing game at the moment, keeping the ball on the ground as much as possible. However, this isn't my usual way of doing things in the lower leagues. I'm going to have to find a big, strong target man up front soon, especially as our wingers are actually half-decent at crossing the ball.
So at the end of July, friendlies are all done and dusted and we're looking forward to the first league game of the season. Our first choice XI at the moment seem to be something like this:
GK: Paul West (15, 5'10") DR: Luke Brown (18, 5'10") DL: Gary Bevan (20, 5'11") DC: Liam Horton (17, 5'10") DC: Jason James (23, 6'0") MR: Jonathan Woolf (17, 5'7") ML: Richard Hatton (16, 5'8") MC: Arran Cavill (22, 5'11") MC: Sean Jackson (16, 5'11") SC: James Cole (20, 5'11") SC: Arthur Appleton (26, 5'9")
That's an average age of just over 19 years old, which is a little on the young side, but there's not a lot I can do about that at the moment. If things start going badly, though, I do have about five older, more experienced guys I could bring in to the first team, but they don't quite have the skills I'm looking for at this club. Time will tell which way the team will go this season, but I'm more than happy to give vaguely talented youth a chance over a set of old has-beens.
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Post by Moo on Oct 20, 2006 9:03:01 GMT
When will you people ever learn? Your keeper needs to be at least 6'1", anything else is on the list, even if his sills are a hell of a lot better than the lamppost I have in goal.
Sheesh.
Anyhoo, nice work on the friendlies and getting your guys fit for the season. KUTGW!
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Post by Boony on Oct 21, 2006 18:05:17 GMT
August 2006August was a month of two halves. We started promisingly, winning two of our first three games, with a 1-0 win over Welling and a 4-0 thumping at Eastbourne. These victories followed an opening day goalless bore-draw against Bishop's Stortford, and we found ourselves second in the league having not conceded a goal. We were kickstarted in the Welling game by half-time subsitute Ashley Dodd, making his debut after signing a contract with us in the week, who scored after an hour, although I have to give full credit to our 15 year old keeper Paul West who made a string of fine saves to keep us in the lead. After we beat 9 man Eastbourne, we went on a three game losing streak in which we didn't manage to score a goal. It all started when Hayes manager Kevin Hill seemed to got the better of me in the pre-match media battles - Hill told me that morale in the Hayes dressing room is extremely high and that his side fear no-one. I then said something that apparently meant that I would do everything in my power to save my side from relegation, even if that means Hayes going down. Now I didn't quite mean that, but never mind. Hill came back by saying that we'll be relegated this season. Ouch. As it turned out, Hayes managed to snatch a 1-0 victory and we went home with our tails between our legs. Our tails seemed to be stuck between our legs in the next two games, as we lost 1-0 against Basingstoke, and then almost took part in a 3-0 humping at Cambridge City. The Basingstoke game was notable for the six yellow cards we picked up, and the game ended with only ten players on each side, while Cambridge were simply better than us. All inall, the second half of August was a fortnight to forget, but we did pick up another couple of youngsters - midfielder Keenen Meakin-Richards and defender Rob Gillman. Both are to be members of the first team squad, with Gillman looking good enough (and big enough, at an impressive 6'4" and 15st 1lb) to command a starting spot from the start. League Record: P6 W2 D1 L3 F5 A5 Pts7
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Post by Boony on Oct 21, 2006 20:57:14 GMT
September 2006If August was a month of two halves, then September was a month of one disappointment. It actually started off quite well, with a relatively comfortable 2-1 win at home to Salisbury. The commentary made me laugh in this one when Salisbury's left winger Alex Haddow was sent off for punching our right winger Jonathan Woolf - I nearly wet myself when I read "...and a great punch it was too!" A visit to top of the table Sutton resulted in a 2-0 loss, and then bottom of the table Farnborough came to Bedford and beat us 2-0 as well, albeit in a slightly closer game. I was worried that we were looking impotent in front of goal - we hadn't produced a single shot on target during the last two games, and we'd only had one goal from a striker all season - Appleton scoring the opener against Salisbury. It was time for some tactical and personnel changes - striker James Cole was turned into a target man, and we moved to more of a direct passing game. I also changed goalkeepers - with Paul West's morale down in the dumps, recent signing Richard Holloway (17, 5'9") took over. We visited Yeading and only lost to their first shot on goal in the 87th minute, a shot that new keeper Holloway probably should have saved. Disappointing, but I was impressed by the way we mainly coped with their 3-4-1-2 formation by asking midfielder Aaran Cavill to man mark their "hole" player. Enough was enough, and I finally started getting shirty with my players. Before the next game, at home to Bognor Regis, I told striker Cole that I was expecting a performance from him today. He responded, too, by scoring in the 31st minute. Unfortunately, Bognor scored either side of half time, but when Cole stepped up in stoppage time to equalise with his second of the game, and season, I was very very happy. The man of the match was our right back Luke Brown, in his first game back from injury since our 4-0 drubbing of Eastbourne last month. He hasn't actually played in a competitive loss this season, so maybe our season was coming back on track? Maybe not. The FA Cup second qualifying round saw non-league Bromley visit, and leave with a 1-0 victory. We were shocking, and I told the lads so in the post match team talk. Embarrassing was the phrase I went for, and they deserved it. League Record: P5 W1 D1 L3 F4 A8 Pts 4
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Post by Boony on Oct 21, 2006 23:34:50 GMT
October 2006If September was a month of disappointment, then October left me feeling suicidal. Three league games, three losses, conceding ten goals. Our fans have started questioning my tactics, saying my unwillingness to change from 4-4-2 could spell trouble if our form does not improve. They want me to experiment. If I thought any of our players could cope with anything more exotic than a 4-4-2, I might think about it, but for now it's hard enough to get them to play well in a regular formation. For those interested in the exact details of our collapse to second from bottom in the league, we lost 4-2 to Dorchester away, Newport came to The Eyrie and won 1-0, and then our visit to Thurrock ended 5-1 to the home side. I'd signed a new keeper Kenny Schofield, 19 years old, 6'1", and less likely to pump goalkicks down the throats of oppositions wingers who then run back and score (third goal by Dorchester). Schofield looked decent against Newport, but let in every single shot on target at Thurrock. To put the icing on the cake, our one midfielder who can tackle, Cavill, is out for 2-3 months with a hip injury. I have run out of ideas already, I don't know how to get this team to do anything other than lose. It's been eight games since that win at the beginning of September, and the encouraging start we had to the season seems an absolute light year away. It might be time to start the sweepstake on when I'm going to be sacked. Still, at least we're not as bad as Braintree :moop: League Record: P3 W0 D0 L3 F3 A10 Pts 0
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Post by Boony on Oct 22, 2006 22:46:50 GMT
November 2006We started November crashing out of the FA Trophy against Brackley, but that's OK as cups are for girls... The best thing about the game was that you could tell how ropey the pitch was from the 2d view of the game. I then decided it was time for a change in the team, so I reintroduced Jason James, Ashley Dodd and Paul West, while giving a first start to our AssMan's favourite striker Barrington Belgrave. The captain's armband was passed to 38 year old Lee Howarth in the hope that his experience would help us out. The game went well, with Cole scoring just before half time. With 20 minutes left we changed to 4-5-1 to hold onto the lead, and Cole then doubled our lead in the 81st minute. It was lucky he did, too, as Braintree scored a consolation goal in stoppage time. Victory! That was it for the month, though, as Weston Super Mare beat us 2-0 at home, while our visit to Lewes saw us trying out the 4-5-1 again. 2-0 down after an hour and we reverted to 4-4-2, with little success. James West saved a penalty late on, but we were never in either of these games. Things are looking pretty precarious now. We're just too leaky at the back, and too impotent up front. Short passes go astray, long passes find opposition defenders, and we're overpowered in midfield far too often. I think it's fair to say that Bedford suck, and I'm not good enough to improve them. It'll be a miracle if we stay up this year. But I haven't been sacked yet... League Record: P3 W1 D0 L0 F2 A4 Pts 3
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Post by Moo on Oct 23, 2006 8:57:25 GMT
You're one place higher than I am in the Conf North. I'm finding this difficult, to be honest. I hope it's becasue of the "Sunday League" tag I gave myself and the Blyth lot not wanting to pay attention to my ramblings, which you can hardly blame them for. I'm trying not to make lots of adjustments all the time and have tried to keep the instructions i do have as simple as possible. The qualities of the players is shocking, but I was expecting to get more points than I have done so far. I still have a chance to escape though, as the bottom seven or eight teams are spread by about 4 or 5 points, if memory serves. But back to your lot and the points spread is a bit wider, so you're going to have to pull something out sooner rather than later. I suggest a new keeper, as you've only used 5 so far.
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Post by Sonic on Oct 24, 2006 4:11:26 GMT
I was getting confused as well, was that 5 keepers signed and then played, or just 5 keepers played?
I have a suggestion for what you could do, the complete opposite of what you are doing. Would that work?
This version sounds like it's going to be a bit more challenging.
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Post by Boony on Oct 24, 2006 8:05:04 GMT
At the moment I have six keepers on the books, and four have played in the first team. One of them only appears in December, though, so you haven't met him yet. I think we started off with three keepers, although that might have been two and I promoted a grey.
I can't remember now :moop:
I think if I did the complete opposite of what I'm doing at the moment, we'd lose every game 6-0.
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Post by Sonic on Oct 24, 2006 8:13:53 GMT
I think if I did the complete opposite of what I'm doing at the moment, we'd lose every game 6-0. Why don't you try it just to test that theory and then tell us the results of what happens. You could chalk it down to an ianteresting experience
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Post by Boony on Oct 24, 2006 8:20:35 GMT
Because I actually want to try and get this lot to stay clear of relegation... We've spent half the season being shit letting everyone get a head start. Now it's time to show our true colours...
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Post by Sonic on Oct 24, 2006 8:22:52 GMT
Do you have the full version? Has it been released already? I was of the impression that it hadn't.
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Post by Moo on Oct 24, 2006 8:32:50 GMT
It was released last Wednesday over here, Sonic. It was supposed to be Friday, but a naughty online retailer started shipping the game on the Monday and it was dropping on the Tuesday, so SPING/SEGA brought the date forward.
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Post by Boony on Oct 24, 2006 8:39:37 GMT
Yeah - I was told about this last Wednesday morning, so that lunchtime I ran to the local GAME store and spent my hard-earned on a lovely shiny box.
That's the most joy it's given me so far, though. It's hard to get excited about a team that's losing every bloody week.
We will turn it around, though. :nark:
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Post by Moo on Oct 24, 2006 9:26:45 GMT
Hope springs eternal, Boo.
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Post by Boony on Oct 25, 2006 8:39:37 GMT
December 2006December saw us bring in our 6th goalkeeper, and the fourth to play in our first team. Introducing Damien Beckford-Qualiey, a 28 year old who brings height (6'3") and experience (6 caps for St Kitts and Nevis) to our rearguard. He also looks like he'll be more consistent - he isn't quite as good a handler as Paul West, but he brings more authority to the penalty area and, crucially, he's not bad at distributing the ball. This might be one player for the future as well as the present. When it actually came to the pitch, though, December started as November ended, with two losses. Eastleigh beat us 1-0 at home, while Havant & Waterlooville just scraped a 3-1 win at their place. I say "scraped" as we hit the bar at 2-1, but they finished the game off soon after. Our goal was scored by substitute Belgrave, his first of the season. Things then took a turn for the surprising, as our away days at Histon and Fisher realised two very similar games. Both times, we went 1-0 down, then went down to ten men, and then equalised in the closing stages of the game. The Fisher game saw a slight change in formation, too, as we changed to a narrow 4-1-2-1-2 as both our left midfielders were injured. It also saw the first signs of frustration from our squad - a yellow card and a red card for fighting in the second half, and the commentary noted us losing our discipline. The month, and the year, were rounded off by a 3-1 loss at Welling (yes, four away games in a row :moop: ). 2-0 down, we pulled it back to 2-1 before half time, but they dominated the second half in a fitting result to end our calendar year. League record: P5 W0 D2 L3 F4 A9 Pts 2
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Post by Mr Bismarck's Electric Donkey on Oct 25, 2006 8:43:32 GMT
That's rough, 800. I'm guessing you're going to need to find 30 points from somewhere in the second half of the season to stay out of the shade at the bottom of the division.
I had a sniff around Damien Beckford-Qualiey as well, but our phone conversation was me asking him if he fancied playing for Montrose and then about eight minutes of laughing. So well done, Bedford are officially a bigger team than my lot. You poof.
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Post by Boony on Oct 25, 2006 8:52:27 GMT
Yeah, we'll need high-midtable form over the rest of the season to get out of this one. 9 points off safety at the moment, with 20 games left. The good news is that, if we get up there, things are looking pretty tight and midtable isn't too far away. But, basically, we need to win every other game. Which isn't looking likely. Still, I haven't been sacked yet :nark:
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Post by Moo on Oct 25, 2006 9:00:37 GMT
There's still time for that.
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