Notts County Third Season — The Transfers

Hello folks, welcome back to the Notts County Football Manager 2010 story. You already now that we are now promoted to Coca-Cola Championship after a very good League One season, we finished it with 113 points and only one league defeat. Now I had to prepare the team for a new and tough challenge against the much better opponents in Championship.

The chairman proved to be quite generous again, so far he gave the club some money at the end of each season! I hope he will keep this nice habit, I like the guy :)

The board’s minimum expectation for the new season was a respectable position but I had to promise them more in order to get some more cash for transfers and wages. I expected a more wealthy transfer budget to be honest and I guess it’s a bit of a risk to promise them promotion but I like to take some chances now and then.

The media prediction for the new season was that we would finish… 12th, not too promising.

OK, enough about predictions and promises, let’s see the transfers. First I brought in several better coaches and a few scouts, that’s very important. I sold a few players that disappointed me last season and got a nice sum for them, around 4 million euro. I already sent out on loan four of the new signings, they are promising youngsters that could become first team players next season.

And now, the new signings! I guess most of the names are unknown to you, some of them are regen players. Anyway, only 6 or 7 of these players will get to play for the first team, the others have already been loaned out or will be loaned out shortly.

Now let me introduce the most important signings.

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First I wanted a good keeper that could provide some competition to Kasper Schmeichel. But I didn’t want to spend much for a keeper, so I chose a free transfer. Ben Amos was released by Manchester United and I offered him a contract, he’s a solid youngster that could show some progress.

I also felt that I needed a new centre back and I went for a regen Argentinian youngster, Martin Martinez from River Plate. He is very talented and considering that he’s only 19 years old I guess he could become a very good player in the future. He can also play as a right back, that’s a good plus.

I sold Mitea, he was disappointing last season, so I needed a new left winger. Last season I had Pedro Botelho on loan from Arsenal and he did quite well, so I was happy that Arsene Wenger agreed to sell him. I already know the lad, he already knows most of his team mates, so he will adapt quickly.

The most expensive transfer was right winger Sam Hinshelwood, a 17 year old English regen. His team, Portsmouth, just got relegated from the Premier League so they had financial problems, otherwise they wouldn’t have agreed to sell him. He is a huge prospect and I will give him the chance to play in the first team, I really believe that he will become a big hit.

I brought quite a few central midfielders, I need good depth in that department. The best of the new lads is Richard Smallwood from Middlesbrough, although he’s very young he has some experience in Coca-Cola Championship.

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I didn’t feel that we needed a new striker but I thought that I could bring one on loan just in case. The one that I chose is Romanian youngster Denis Alibec from Internazionale Milano, they agreed to loan him for free.

Last but not least, there’s an exciting prospect in this year’s youth intake! He’s a centre back and his name is Mike Lake. I already offered him a professional contract because Arsenal and Aston Villa are trying to buy him, they made offers from 500K to 1 million for him!

Remember, you can always check out the whole squad and the player profiles in the current squad pages, I will update them every season.

The friendly games went pretty well, we won most of them by scoring lots of goals. The only defeat was at the hands of Aston Villa but we had a good chance of getting a draw in that game, Aston Villa scored the winning goal in the last minute.

The three teams that just got relegated from the Premier League were the favorites to gain promotion, Portsmouth, Bristol City and Sheffield Wednesday. There are also other good teams around like Newcastle or Bolton but I hope we will have the strength to fight for promotion.

The first game of the season will be a very difficult one, away at league favorites Portsmouth. We’ll also have Sheffield Wednesday and Bolton to play in August, so we’ll have no time to adapt, we’ll have to play as good as we can right from the start.

That’s about it for now but I have a big question for you before ending this post. Uruguay’s manager got sacked and I decided to apply for the job just to see if they would select me. And guess what, they did! Now I don’t know what to do, should I accept the offer and manage Uruguay and Notts County at the same time? I really need your suggestions to decide. Thanks, I’m looking forward to hearing your opinions.

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