Season Six, November: Climbing the Table

Point by point...
The win at Southampton provided a platform to build on. In the next two games (home to Pompey and away to Blackburn), Oxford fell behind in the first ten minutes, but pulled it back to 1-1. The pair of draws hauled the team out of the drop zone for the first time this season. The downside was an injury to key midfielder Vegard Nordtveit, who would miss six league games.

Then came two defeats: an unlucky 1-0 loss at home to "dirty" Leeds, with a sucker-punch 45th minute goal; followed by a trip to the Emirates, where the defence did their best but Miroslav Klose sealed a 2-0 Gunners win.

Now back down to 19th, the live home game vs. Birmingham looked a must-win. And we pulled through, again coming from behind (though Anderson Silva levelled within a minute) to win 3-1. It was down to earth with a bump in the next two games. Everton, only just outside the drop-zone, romped home 3-0 with two goals in the first ten minutes. Then Oxford were dumped out of the League Cup after an insipid 1-0 loss at home to West Brom. I gave the players a good bollocking - or as good as the FM06 team talk mechanism will allow - after that one.

Turning The Corner
Then possibly the unluckiest game I've had, at home to QPR. I decided to give Anichebe a try after no goals by any of my forwards in five games; he was injured after just 7 minutes. Makes a change from conceding early! That was it for the first half, but a Rossi penalty put the good guys in front shortly after half-time. QPR equalised midway through the half, prompting continuous Oxford pressure. With five minutes left, Iversen had a goal disallowed with a frankly dubious decision, and then in the last minute, Rossi missed a penalty.

My players let their frustrations out in fine style in the next match, walloping the barber poles of Sunderland 4-0 on their own patch! Then, just as the ground expansion had been completed (capacity now 15,000 instead of 12,500), came my proudest moment on Football Manager: keeping Rooney, van Nistelrooy at bay for 87 minutes, then snatching a winner courtesy of Harry Kewell in the 88th. Oxford 1 Manchester United 0, the stuff dreams are made of. I punched the air alright!

Amazing Match
Oxford were up to 13th after two successive wins, and next was a live game at Charlton. Clearly wanting to put on a show for the cameras, forwards Iversen & Rossi fired Oxford 2-0 up after just 7 minutes. It didn't end there: Flood got a goal back, Lercher made it 3-1, Parsons scored a penalty for Charlton, and then Darren Bent equalised: 3-3 after 31 minutes! There was even time for Charlton to miss a penalty before half-time.
The second half proved far less eventful, as Flood scored again and Oxford, potentially drained after the United match, ran out of energy. It finished 4-3 to Charlton.

Crunch Time
So, after all that excitement, I'm up to 15th, three points clear of the drop zone.
The next four games could be pivotal: I face three of my closest rivals at home, starting with Norwich, who came up with me last season. As highlighted in the table, it is still pretty tight with four points separating 13th from 19th. Five points from these four games, and I'll reach the half-way mark with 20 points, half-way to the traditional target of 40.

RESULTS & FIXTURES

LEAGUE TABLE: 3 December 2010

Season Six, August: A tough start indeed

My first three fixtures, away to Liverpool (who had finished 2nd two years ago), at home to Chelsea (who had finished 2nd the previous seaon), and away to Newcastle (who had finished 3rd two years ago, and signed Woodgate and Hargreaves during the Summer), would look tough to anyone, let alone a team who had been promoted two seasons running and so was still largely made up of players more used to Huddersfield and Brighton than the Premier League elite.

Therefore, I present my summer signings:
Harry Kewell (free transfer, Liverpool), a genuine left-winger, and one with vast amounts of top flight experience. He was injured after 25 minutes of my first match :P
Giuseppe Rossi (free transfer, Man United), a talented young striker with bags of potential.
Victor Anichebe (£675k ,Everton), bought on a permanent basis after a successful loan spell. He's happy to be a back-up striker for now
Sorin Nicusor Radoi (£875k, Dinamo - Bucharest, presumably), a right-back with good stats, brought in to provide competition to the error-prone Bodnár.
Jack Hobbs (Season Loan, Liverpool), a centre-back who starred as England U21s dominated during the summer of 2010.

I also added some more staff members, most importantly, an assistant manager you will have heard of: Sammy Lee, from Bolton. Here are his stats:
16s across the board, making him easily my best coach.

So, now to the matter of taking on Liverpool at Anfield. I played a defensive formation, with a flat back four, two defensive midfielders (Silva and Flamini), Iversen and Nordtveit on the wing, but as ML/R rather than AML/R, and Lercher in central midfield with just one up front. We lost 3-0 thanks to a couple of goals from set pieces early on. For the visit of Chelsea, I used the same tactics. We took the lead early on through fans' favourite Kyle Wilson, but were 3-1 down by half-time. Away to Newcastle, the difference in class told again, and another 3-0 defeat kept us rooted to the bottom spot.
I felt we had more of a chance at home to Man City, so I switched to 4-4-2. We still fell behind, but Anderson Silva forced an equaliser and it was 1-1 at half-time. City scored again early in the second half, but still we pressed on in search of our first point. Then just a few minutes from the end, we had a goal disallowed :-(
Four defeats in a row, but at least we were off the bottom (on goals scored), as Norwich were still on zero points and had lost by more.
Then, some salvation: we won 2-0 away to Southampton, who would have gone top had they avoided defeat! Rossi, partnering Iversen up front, scored both goals, and it was comfortable in the end. So we're up to 18th, and the next match is at home to fellow strugglers Portsmouth. I'm not too down-hearted yet, since all five of the teams we have played are in the top seven, but it would be nice to get some more points...


In light of our leaking goals at the back, I've splashed just over £4m on another Scandinavian, Espen Ruud. He can play anywhere across the defence, but I'll be using him at left-back. I'll let you know how he settles in next time. Hopefully the presence of Iversen and Nordtveit should make it easier.

Summer Transfers

Partnerships

Central Defenders

It's about time I introduced you to some of my key players. First, my centre-back pairing: Moses Reed, the young Swedish international; and Madjid Bougherra, who has just signed for Rangers in the real world.
Moses Reed was one of my first signings in the January transfer window of 2006, although he was only 17 then so I didn't play him until the next season, although the season after that he was a permanent fixture.
I got Bougherra on a free transfer three seasons ago, and built my defence around him. He's very tall (190cm), strong and has good mental and defensive stats. Surprisingly, he hasn't scored for me yet in 139 appearances.

Central Midfielders

Anderson Silva was another free transfer, brought in at the same time as Bougherra, whereas Flamini was a 275k snip from Brighton (see earlier post). They both have good mental and physical stats, although Silva is slightly better technically. Since signing Flamini, I've been letting Silva get forward more often, and he got six goals and thirteen assists last season.

Just a short one: August update coming soon...