The Joys of (Amateur) Football Management….

Going into the game, I was happy, I was confident. I had 13 players, including 2 subs that I knew were decent at football.

Kick-off was looming, I gathered the players round in a circle and started telling them how I wanted us to play. Utilise the wings, let our wingers use their pace. Hit the channels and use the speed of the striker to get onto the ball over the top. Keep it on the deck when we can to bring their defence out and then hit it over the top. In my head, it all sounded good, the players looked like they had taken it on board.

Again, I won the coin-toss and I wasn’t allowed (apparently it is a rule) to opt to kick-off, so I stayed as we were, knowing that we’d have the slight slope in the 2^nd half.

The game started and we didn’t switch on. Straight from kick-off a ball was played down the right which was flicked into the striker who’s first time shot beat the keeper and we were 1-0 down with around 10 seconds played – shocking. I tried my hardest to shout encouragement at my players, telling them to get stuck in and switch on.

My mind was racing and thinking about what I could do to change the situation. It was too early and would have been to knee-jerk to change anything after such little time.

We got the ball down and passed it around. But were hit twice in quick succession and I found my team 3-0 down with 10 minutes to half-time. It appeared everything they struck was going in. The half-time whistle blew and I couldn’t wait to get the lads around.

If this was Football Manager, my team-talk would have been “aggressive – I want to see something different from you”. I lay into my players, saying how we had discussed before about what we wanted to do, and that no-one was doing it. I ended with some encouraging words about how even if we lose, we need to go back to the changing rooms and say we gave it our all. I handed over to my vice-captain, who again, re-iterated the points that we hadn’t shown up, we had shown nothing that we were capable of – “everyone needed to step up”.

 The "Aggressive"teamtalk.... It didn't work for Phil Brown and it didn't work for me.

We went out for the 2^nd half and immediately put them on the back foot. Camping in the opposition half, we pummelled them with long throws and corners, with the ball always just falling out of reach of the striker.  I thought to myself “That’s done the trick, the lads have listened”.

A few minutes later, due to some shoddy defending and bad luck, we were 4-0 down. I subbed myself off and brought a substitute.

From the sidelines, I tried my best to encourage the team, but to no avail. 5, 6, 7-0 down. I tried to get the lads to play for some pride and encouraged them to attack. We got a goal back, a scrappy tap-in from a throw in. But, heads were down. The game finished as a 9-1 loss. I felt terrible. This was shocking. The opposition weren’t anything good, they didn’t really out play us. I was gutted. On basis of play, we deserved to lose, but not that heavily.

The lads all came in after the game and we spoke for a few minutes about what had happened. “We didn’t show, we had no heart, we let them bully us”. After speaking to them sternly and honestly, they all agreed that must do so much better next week. I finished off with “Right, we sweep this under the carpet and learn from it. We have to play better next week”.

The lads trundled back to the changing rooms miserable, I hang around with my vice-captain to discuss which lads we wanted to keep, what we were going to do next week and what formation to play.

In the pub after we literally dissected everything about the game. Tactics will change and the lads have to work harder. We need to stop trying to play football and clear the ball when it is needed. Get more shots of, utilise the wingers, play an out and out holding midfielder to help the defence.

Anyway, after a spanking like that, I just wanted to get on to the next match and put it right. Unfortunately for the guys, I’m taking the next training session and they are going to have to work very hard to make up for that performance.

So, still looking for that first legitimate win, and hoping to not get another drubbing. 

Cup game next week, and we have been drawn against the league champions of the division above us..... Brilliant.