Notts County FM 2010 Story — November 2009

Hello dear friends, welcome back to the Notts County Football Manager 2010 story! Things were looking great at the end of October, we were unbeaten in League Two after 15 games and the board decided to give me some more transfer money to spend in January! But until then we had to prove that we deserved such a generous chairman :)

The first game in November was the FA Cup 1st round match with Blue Square Premier side Oxford. It was quite easy, my players controlled the game without any difficulty and scored four goals without spending too much energy.

It wasn’t going to be as easy in the next game though, we had to face Leeds United in the Johnstone’s Paint Trophy Quarter Final! Leeds were the best team in League One at the moment and they also were the only team that defeated us this season, 2-1 in the Carling Cup back in August. We had the chance to get revenge and my players were determined to show their skills on the pitch. The first 20 minutes were absolutely crazy, we went 1-0 and 2-1 up but Leeds always managed to peg us back. They dominated the first half but it ended all square. The second half was a completely different story, my boys dominated the game but unfortunately they missed the chances so it all went down to the penalty shootout… Kasper Schmeichel, my goalkeeper, had some magical moments, he saved three out of four penalty shots and we were through to the next round! Beautiful! :)

After the great victory over Leeds we had another tough battle coming up, away at 2nd placed Bury. We had three important players away on international duty but that wasn’t a big problem. The game was very boring, both teams looked like they were afraid to lose it. The ball was stuck in midfield most of the time and the result was a nice and clean 0-0.

The next game was at home with 21st placed Aldershot, we had to win it. We did that eventually but the performance was definitely not one of the best.

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Next up, we had a difficult away game at 9th placed Rochdale. Francois Zoko, my poacher, made it easier for us once again, he scored an early goal with a fine shot from 20 yards out. Rochdale tried to get back on level terms, they dominated the game but my defense was rock solid.

The league table was looking better and better for us, it would be a disaster not to get promoted at this stage.

We had one more game to play before the end of the month, the FA Cup second round match with Port Vale. We dominated the game quite comfortably and we should have been better in attack and win it by a bigger margin. Anyway, we were through to the next round where we are going to meet Premier League side Bolton Wanderers, the game will be played in January!

We’ll have another difficult clash with a League One side in December, we’ll play Huddersfield in the Johnstone’s Paint Trophy Semi Final!

That’s how November was, we did quite well and I was very pleased that we managed to knock out Leeds United, even on penalties. We have to keep up the good form in December and I hope we will, stay tuned to find out. ;)