Part 31: Chapter the First: The gang goes to summer camp.

Chapter the First: The gang goes to summer camp.
July 1, 2015-August 1, 2015

We'll have a new physio and Ass Man in a day or two, but first I'm proud to announce a new sponsorship:



£2,500 a year? Who's sponsoring this? Some kid's lemonade stand?



The free transfers I mentioned in the last update come on board, in time to join the training camp squad.



We could double our wage bill and not even breach the FFP cap.



Didn't we just do this last year? I'm not going to negotiate with anyone yet, as I need to see how they perform in our new league. Simpson is likely to get a new contract, though. We'll look at this again in December, before any foreign teams could poach our players by signing them to a pre-contract.



The 2015 model Ass Man. Now with slightly better training skills and even better at judging talent.



Sheffield Wednesday, bitter rivals of Sheffield United, are currently in the Championship. Wrexham's run in the league cup is likely to be very short and the opposite of sweet.



I'm hoping that we get to at least March before the field condition is back to terrible, but I'm setting the over/under for it being a muddy field at Christmas. Person who's closest to the date of the field condition becoming "Terrible" gets to change one thing in the game via the editor.



After a long day's practice and drills we can sit around the campfire and tell ghost stories and braid each other's hair and stay up after curfew and sneak over to the Swansea training camp on a panty raid!



The only obvious soft points in the team are at keeper and right back. An additional defensive midfielder option would be nice, though. Our tactics don't utilize the ML/R and WBL/R positions, so our weakness there is merely academic. The problem is that while we have OK depth and most of our starting 11 are above average to good we don't have any superb players that will be able to win us matches on their own. I haven't been able to find anyone matching that description, at least at the price we're able to pay.



We've got nearly 10k remaining in the wage budget, so if we can find players to fill those roles we have the money to sign them.



As I don't expect to find anyone useful at the trial day I tell my scouts to just compile reports on the most promising players rather than sit through the game myself.



Finally, I've been trying to sell this guy for a year.



You're not making a good case for remaining team captain if you can't even get on the playing field, old man.



Crud. We're now down to three centerbacks on the first team. We should be OK, both players will be back by the second week of the season, but I'm going to check to see if any of our youth players are suitable as an emergency backup.

At The New Saints, July 11, 2015
Friendly


It's a good thing I scheduled TNS during what turned out to be our training camp. During training camps you can only schedule friendlies with nearby teams, and TNS is the biggest team in Wales. Well, more like the 4th or 5th biggest, but they're the biggest side that plays in the Welsh league. I'm trying out our new 4-2-3-1 formation, but will probably shift back to a 4-5-1 as the game progresses and I sub players in. We pile on a ton of pressure, but as expected are susceptible to the counter. Just looking at the stats you'd expect that we had won by a wide margin, but TNS finishes incisively, we don't finish at all, and despite bossing the match we lose. I go through and give individual talks to players, and all is going well until I tell Don-Duncan that his performance wasn't up to snuff.



I'm not sure why this happened, but prior to this everyone had reacted positively, but when I treated Don-Duncan the same as I had every other player who played as poorly as he did I lost the whole locker room. Odd, and annoying. Not the best introduction to my pep talks for the new guys, either.

TNS 2-0 Wrexham



Norwich's players will actually deign to join us now that we're in the Football League, this is the first of the two I'm loaning. Also, you may have noted I've renamed the supporter spokesperson. I'm taking suggestions on what his final name should be.

Paul Azille-Moore
Right Winger


He's not particularly good in any area, but he'll suffice for cover on the wings. He's got a very high ceiling, a leading Championship player is roughly an average Premier League player so if he develops with us I'll probably try to extend his loan.



Our second loaner.

Graeme Underwood
Right Back


I'm very happy to have picked Underwood up, as my efforts to find a defensive minded fullback on the free agent and transfer markets have been stymied by our lack of stature and bigger clubs swooping in to grab them up. It doesn't help that fullback is one of the hardest positions to play in modern soccer. These days a fullback's responsibilities mix the attacking skills of a winger and the defensive obligations of a centerback, and then adding work rate and stamina requirements to run up and down the field all game long. Finding a good one is hard. Finding a great one is nigh impossible. Underwood will rotate with Wright, who probably doesn't have the defensive chops to be a full time right back in League football.



No more playing with funky field shapes, we're in boring organized pro-soccer now.



As I was saying about fullbacks, it's hard to find one that can do everything.

Matthew Ashton
Left Back


Ashton will be our defensive option at left back, as neither Don-Duncan nor Daniel are close to as good at that aspect of the game. I don't expect him to be with us more than a couple of years, his peak ability should make him capable of being left back for a good league one side. He'll be working on his acceleration, as he'll be going up against speedy wingers and currently doesn't speed up quickly enough to lock them down when they make runs past him.



And on the last night we made smores and swore each other to secrecy about the vagrant we accidentally killed.



Found a spare central defender.

Gary Petit
Centerback


And boy howdy did I ever get lucky on this one. He's only 17, so when he's not needed for cover he can train with the U18 side for the next two years, and he's already good enough to be a backup at League Two level. Now we have six viable centerbacks at all levels of the squad, and that should be more than enough depth.



I was going to loan out Nic Bull, seeing as no one appeared to be interested in him. When I offered him up Hereford asked to take him off our hands permanently. I eagerly accepted, and assuming contract negotiations between Bull, Murray, and their new teams are successful we no longer have any players at the club I'm actively seeking to get rid of.



Anthony Walsh is going to either Worcester or Kidderminster for the year, he's aged out of the U18 squad and he's not good enough to get playing time on the senior squad. So rather than have him sit lonely and forgotten in the U21 squad I've found him a place where he can get first team action and that will pay his salary besides.



I've reconsidered my release of Justin Bailey in light of his favorable comparison to Aiden Cooper. When I found out that his price had dropped precipitously during the two weeks he was unemployed, I was happy to bring him back into the club. He ended up getting a £100/wk raise from his last contract, and will never understand all the inside jokes the other players share from training camp. Poor guy. The silver lining is that he's not afflicted by the curse of the vagrant we killed.



I can't offer high win bonuses? What the shit? Our wage budget is only £35,000/wk right now, and we're a net seller on transfers this year with the Nsangou sale. Stupid Financial Fair Play.




Glad I chose to aim for a consolidation year. I think we can do better than what the bookies predict, but my sterling winning percentage as a manager is going to get tarnished. Meanwhile... Tackleford...



League Two teams have spent 2,880,000 pounds on transfers this offseason. Tackleford comprises 92% of that total. And that doesn't even count the purchases before the year officially rolled over, like Nsangou. I've created a monster.



Hey, this field isn't perfect! What's the big idea here, landlords? I don't want to get my shit kicked in for a paycheck on anything less than a pristine field.

vs. Arsenal, July 17, 2015
Friendly


There were some positives in this match. We didn't give up a chance until the 29th minute despite 10 shots from Arsenal, and we didn't let them score until the 39th minute on their second chance of the game. We held them from getting a second goal until the 53rd minute, and then quickly struck back on a great breakaway by Clarke to make it 2-1 in the 58th minute. Unfortunately, after that our second stringers couldn't stop Arsenal from scoring at will, and they got tired of playing with their food.



The kids at least realize we did well just to keep the score at 2-1 through an hour of play, and even with 20 minutes left the score was only 3-1. That final deluge was very disappointing considering how well we played for most of the game.

Wrexham 1-8 Arsenal



This is my last planned signing. Unless I see someone too good to ignore I'm done for the transfer window. Once Bull and Murray transfer we'll have wages of £34,500 a week, £8,300 under budget, and £44,000 left for transfers. Considering we were spending just over £35,000/wk last season, I'm pretty happy with the shopping I've done.

Ashti Kadhim
Defensive Midfielder


Kadhim will be a backup, along with McGuinness, for Simpson and the more defensive midfield roles. His stats are all around fairly strong, but he's got no determination, which means that he'll be prone to giving up when things get hard, whether it's on the pitch or the practice ground. Oh, also, he's a current international for Iraq, which I didn't realize until his national team coach called him up for international friendlies at the end of July.



This kid has at most the potential to be a mediocre Skill Regional player, and refused an opportunity to get first team playing time in the Welsh league. Enjoy your brief career in my youth system, and then wistfully talking about the days when you could have played professional first team soccer when you're older.



Murray rejected his contract offer, probably over the paycut he'd have to take. I'm going to dump him and Bull into the U21 reserves now, hopefully it will chivvy them along in signing contracts elsewhere.



Well, that paid off quickly. Bull signs with the Bulls. There's something funny about that, but I can't quite figure out what.



There's a player who knows where his best interests lie. Kick some ass in the Skrill Premier, Walshy.

vs. Chester, July 21, 2015
Friendly


Wrexham and Chester have a longstanding rivalry due to their locations twelve miles apart on opposite sides of the Wales/England border. The Cross Border Derby (pronounced "dar-bey" for our North American readers) has been contested 148 times since the first meeting in 1888, with Wrexham winning 67, drawing 31, and losing 50. We don't see them very often now as Chester was relegated to the Skrill North the year before we took over Wrexham, and thus no longer play league matches against them. According to one website of questionable authority, a particular chant at these games is “Fuck off Chester. We won at Wembley, we won at Wembley, we won at Wembley.”

Chester parks the team bus in front of their net and utilize a Greek style of frustrating, negative play. We can't crack them open in the first half, so I loosen up our tactics to focus less on controlling the game and more on open play and it results in many more shots and eventually a goal off of a corner kick. The subs finish rotating in by the 70th minute, and we seal the game when Chester is called for a penalty against Hopkins shortly thereafter. Bailey finishes the scoring with a screaming free kick hit from 25 yards out, and all of our scoring came from dead ball situations. Fuck off Chester, indeed.

Wrexham 3-0 Chester



I'm going to see how much it'd cost to get him to agree to a mutual termination of his contract. I've been trying to rid this team of this lackadaisical, gormless, addlepated twerp since I got here, and he just won't leave. Maybe they fired the old coach for giving him this contract?



Oh for fucks sake. Can I fire him, please? It'd cost just as much money as keeping him all season, except in a lump sum. It's £82k, so I guess I really shouldn't and hope instead that at some point someone wants him over the course of the season. But if we get to the end of January and I'm still not rid of this meddlesome winger I'm going to ask for reals.



That's actually one of the better World Cup qualifying pools Wales could have been drawn into. They might finish 3rd. They still won't make the World Cup, though.

vs. Llansantffraid, July 26, 2015
Friendly


This is our final tune-up of the pre-season. To be honest, I picked Llansantffraid as an opponent because it has a humorous sounding name. And we ain't afraid of no Llansantffraid. An easy win should help boost morale right before the season starts.

The game goes as well as I could have hoped for, we score two in the first and two more in the second, while Llansantfraid is too terrified to venture out of their own half but for taking one shot late in the game. A good final friendly before our return to League Two.

Wrexham 4-0 Llansantffraid



That was an unpleasant task. It's time to pick the team captains for the year, and Tierney just won't get enough playing time to make an effective captain. He's has done everything I've asked of him without question, and done it well. It's like the end of Ol' Yeller, if Ol' Yeller were an aging centerback who you were asking to relinquish a position for the good of the team. So, not at all like Ol' Yeller.



The captain's band is given to Stuart Simpson, our midfield anchor. Just as good a leader as Tierney and a straight up determinator, he's likely to be on our team for several years more. Tierney will be our vice captain, as a gesture of gratitude for his leal service.




Wait, so who's hurt, Ioan or Eoin? I can never tell them apart.



Neill Senior is so going to hate me.

Nasser Al-Beloushi
Goalkeeper



I said I was done buying unless I found someone extraordinary. Al-Beloushi is extraordinary. The Kuwaiti keeper is immediately the best at his position in League Two, and one of the very best players in the league, period. He already speaks English fluently, so there won't even be communication issues. I'm going to have to sell Senior, there's no reason to have three first team goalkeepers, but this immediately improves the team in one of our weakest areas. I wonder if he and Kadhim will get along?



This brings up one of the more infuriating things about being a LLM if you don't understand the rules. Work permits. Because Al-Beloushi is a non-European Union citizen he needs a work permit to play in England. If he doesn't get a work permit, he can't play for us.

To get a work permit a player needs to play in 75% of his country's non-friendly international matches (World Cup qualifiers, continental championships, etc.) over the last two years or be an elite young talent. Their home country must also have a FIFA ranking of 70 or better. The team making the signing must be in the Football League, meaning that we could not have picked up Al-Beloushi without having been promoted. So he gets his work permit thanks to the first criteria, and because he was already at Nottingham Forest last year it doesn't seem to matter that Kuwait is only ranked 83rd in the world. There's other ways to get around the work permit requirements, but as they won't be available to us for several years I'll save that for later.



Not only is Simpson willing to help Al-Beloushi settle in, his morale actually goes up from my asking. Good job on picking a new captain, me.



I should have asked for more money, given how quickly four teams jumped at the chance to sign Senior.



Who are these sponsors? Local haberdasheries? Money is money, but I'll be looking forward to renegotiating this in four years for more than a pittance.



Newport County approached me with an offer for Tierney just as I was looking at three very good centerbacks and pondering whether I could fit them into the already large senior team. It makes me sad to see him go, but he wouldn't get much playing time here and since I removed him from the captaincy several days ago the staff keeps finding him crying in the training room's hot tub. Also, our oldest player is now just 29. Don't trust anyone over 30, except for the manager.



The appointment of Simpson as captain is greeted happily in the clubhouse, with one exception.



McGuinness is at 18/17 in Leadership/Determination, so he's right that he's a good choice for captain. If he weren't a backup I'd have considered him. He gets the vice-captaincy that Tierney just vacated.




McGavin is one of the three potential replacements for Tierney. The first of the three, George Evans, was signed by Tackleford for nearly three times as much as we were offering. Their weekly wages are somewhere north of £100,000 now, so we'll get to see how Financial Fair Play works ingame. I'm pretty sure we'll get McGavin, but if we don't I've already made a contract offer to our third choice.



We're at the edge of our first season in the Football League since 2007. Onwards, Wrexham, and burn all those who oppose us to the ground! Or, y'know, at least avoid relegation.



Also, for those of you who just click to the most recent unread posts, I've been updating the OP with ETAs for future chapters with progress percentages. They can vary wildly over time, but so far it's been entirely towards new updates coming before the original schedule rather than being delayed.