Bury FC: January

Hi everyone, welcome back to my January as i bring you an update of January earlier than most of you would have expected!

Before I start showing results, lets look at the state of the club after half a season. It will give you more in depth information how it is like inside the club.

FINANCES

As you can see we are 275k in debt. We started off with around 160k-180k in the bank, but somehow we have gone in 275k in debt! Every month we are losing are losing around 30k-50k. It has nothing to do with wages or transfers as i am 1k under the wage budget. It seems there is less income. Our capacity of the stadium is 11840 but our average attendence this season is only 3394 (!!!!) despite being top of the table. So, somehow I have to attract more people to the ground. I suppose it isn’t a big worry but the balance is  only going to get bigger, however if we win promotion, that money will be helpful.

Player Stats

As you can see Danny Carlton leads the goalscoring charts at the moment. Rhys Murphy is not far behind also. Danny Carlton is also 3rd in the Assists charts along with the Man of the Match and Average Rating charts.

Pitch and Training Facilities

I should have shown this screenshot at the start of the season. Stadium condition is good however the pitch is VERY POOR! I will ask the board at the end of the season to relay the pitch and i may also ask for an improvement to the training facilities. Our youth recruitment is fairy basic, but Lee Dixon started his career at Bury!

January Transfers

Season expectations was changed from Promotion to ‘Winner’ We were given a 6k budget along with the wage budget being increased by 5k

IN

Two players were brought in the window. Right-Back Guillaume Norbert was signed on a free transfer, much better than my two other right-backs, Ben Hoskin and Tom Lees. However Tom Lees has now returned to his parent club so this transfer was needed. The only attributes he lacks is probably Marking, Natural Fitness and Stamina.

 We also signed Paudie Quinn, an 18 year old who will provide better back up to the central midfield than the players we already have. His wage is only 95k and his value has increased to 90k since joining the club.

We also sold Damien Mozika and Andy Howarth as they weren’t getting a game and were taking around 1.5k of the wage budget. We also managed to raise 15k for transfer fees.

JANUARY FOOTBALL

We started the month by playing our 3rd game in the space of 5 days so we had to rotate a lot. I had to chuck Guilaume Norbert in for his first game even though he was ‘severly lacking match fitness’

BURY TEAM: Richie Branagan; Ben Hoskin, Sam Sodge, Marco Teani, Phil Picken; Guilaume Norbert, Marcel Mahouve, Ali Fuseini, Michael Jones; Danny Carlton, Rhys Murphy

After going a goal down just before half time, the team came back in the second half and started playing really well. Marcel Mahouve scored a screamer from 30 yards and Ryan Lowe won us the game by converting a cross. Connor Henderson came off the bench and unluckily suffered a groin injury which will keep him out for 3 weeks.

2 days later we played Torquay away which meant 4 games in  7 days!!! It was getting ridiculas and my players were starting to suffer from this run of games. We had to play 37 year old CB Efe Sodge partnering his younger brother Sam Sodge. We also were forced to play a DM/CM Steven Schumacher at left back and reserve Damien Mozika at DM. We were also forced to change to a 4-3-3 formation.

BURY TEAM: Richie Branagan; Tom Lees, Sam Sodge, Efe Sodge, Steven Schumacher; Manu, David Mozika, Lolo, Ali Fuseini, Michael Jones, Ryan Lowe; Danny Carlton

Torquay took the lead through an Elliot Benyon goal. My players were exhausted at half time which forced me to bring on two subs. Rhys Murphy was one of them and he scored in the 62nd minute which gave us enough time to find the winner. The winner eventually came in the 93rd minute where Ali Fuseini converted a cross with his foot very smartly. He was also man of the match and also stepped up his case of taking over Connor Henderson (who is injured) permanantly in midfield. We came back from a goal behind to win the game for the second time in a row!

Our next match was our first home game of the month against Hereford. Only 3292 fans turned up out of a possible 11000 which made me mad! Once again we went a goal down. However that goal was cancelled out in the first half as Rhys Murphy got on the scoresheet again. Shortly after half time Ali Fuseini scored a goal which gave us the lead. He seems to have really settled in now and playing at the top of his game. He certainly scores more than Connor Henderson. A third goal followed 17mins later as Andy Bishop scored. Phil Picken also got sent off in the game. Once a again we came back from a goal down to win the game. This was the third time in a row — A HAT TRICK! lol

BURY TEAM: Richie Branagan; Ben Hoskin, Sam Sodge, Marco Teani, Phil Picken; Manu, Marcel Mahouve, Ali Fuseini, Robbie Brady; Andy Bishop, Rhys Murphy

7 days later we travelled to the Greenhous Meadow to play Shrewsbury. We were full of confidence after winning the last three games. We were also expecting to go a goal down :-) but instead we took the lead through Rhys Murphy! Having taken the lead for the first time in the month, we eventually went on to lose the game 2-1. GRR!

BURY TEAM: Richie Branagan; Ben Hoskin, Sam Sodge, Marco Teani, Joe Skarz; Manu, Marcel Mahouve, Ali Fuseini, Robbie Brady; Andy Bishop, Rhys Murphy

Our next game saw Northampton come to Gigg Lane. There was a small increase in attendence, around 80. I was looking for a positive response from our defeat in our last game. We absolutely smashed them!

BURY TEAM: Richie Branagan; Ben Hoskin, Sam Sodge, Marco Teani, Joe Skarz; Manu, Lolo, Ali Fuseini, Robbie Brady; Andy Bishop, Rhys Murphy

HIGHLIGHTS: http://www.youtube.com/user/sayam55?feature=mhum#p/a/u/0/MelEokrwnYk

Our last game of the season saw us lose to Oxford. We also lost Rhys Murphy to a 5 week injury, just when he was in top form! :-(

So, at the end of the month we were still in first place but only leading by 2 points.

Anyway, thanks for reading. It is a pretty long post but I hope you enjoyed it! Take care, Sayam