[Other Sport] [FM18 Story] The Brightonian road to World Cup victory

[Swansman]

July, 2017


Just days after it was revealed that Gareth Southgate had an affair with Sven-Göran Eriksson back in 2003, the English FA announced that they had found a replacement.

- My name is Anotah Potter and I come from a land down under. With the help of a brand new strategy I will help England win the World Cup. The one next year or the one after that.

What have you accomplished in Australia?
- Australia? Who said anything about Australia? I come from Atlantis. But I grew up in Borehamwood.

You come from...? eh... lets just move on. What is this strategy you are speaking of?
- I am inspired by how Brighton performs in the future in a different dimension. We will only use Brighton players. Players born in Brighton. Maybe Hove. Players who played for their hot sexy football club. Players who will join the club in this dimension or the other.

The headlines were obvious. The Guardian: "England hires most sensible manager since Terry Venables". The Sun decided to go with a one word front page: "Yes."

Creating the national team pool


The first task for mr Potter was to create a national team pool of 40 or 50 players, as not everyone could be expected to be healthy and in form at all times.
Due to the requirements, this was no easy task.

The first obvious move was to add every current English Brighton player to the national team pool.
Secondly, searching for players who either counted as Brighton homegrowns or had the club as their favorite, since it would in most cases be the result of having previously played for the club.

And the third possible criteria: being born in Brighton.

The search found 56 players. Around ten of them were already added in the first stage, as they belong to the club. A few players were ineligeble: like Danny Drinkwater. Brighton is apparently his favorite club but he wasnt born in the city and never played for the club, meaning he needs to go **** himself. Same with Wolves Jordan Graham.

There is also a small chance that one or two players tagged along due to being friends with Marc Albrighton. Every player will be investigated closer upon selection.

Additionally, a few players who had not signed for the club back in 2017 was also included in the national team pool - like youngsters Matt Clarke and Adam Webster, among others. More on this in the next update.

 

[Neville's Breakfast]

Pardon ?

 

[darkwolf666]

And who said the drugs don't work...?

 

[Hampden Park]

1600 hours

 

[AmexRuislip]

 

[studio150]

Looking forward to this odyssey which hopefully won't be grounded on the rocks.

Will it end with Arise Sir Anotah Potter, or Potter you're sacked.

Well something has to fill the void until the season restarts

 

[vagabond]

This has the potential to be your best work since the Pizza Boxes @%1; I shall be watching with interest.

 

[Dorset Seagull]

Knowing FM I give him 6 months

 

[Swansman]

August 2017

The first squad (vs Slovakia & Slovenia)


Goalkeepers


There are four decent keepers to choose from. We went with David Stockdale, David Button and Jason Steele this time around, as Walton struggled with injury. Plan is to give Button & Stockdale one game each as they are relatively close in quality and we want to get a sense of both of the guys.

Defenders


There is unfortunately not too many elegible defenders around outside of the selected ones, especially looking weak on the left side and we will see what we do with it as Demetriou is a bit... something.

Midfield


Midfield situation is pretty rough, defensively it looks alright but the attacking options are quite poor, especially with Solly March injured and unavailable for these two games.

Strikers


Glenn Murray and Ashley Barnes... not too shabby. Or actually quite fecking shabby but in a good way. Sam Baldock out injured means Greg Luer and Conor Chaplin enters the squad. And since we were able to select one more player, we also brought along young talent Dan Cashman.

Press conference ahead of the games


While it was obvious the squad was weird and crazy, the journalists stayed quite respectful - like you would do if you would talk with Charles Manson or a severly retared person.

Your first squad is interesting... how are you planning to play?
- In the end we hope to play Potterball. But first maybe Hughtonball.

Potterball? What is your style of football?
- You got it all wrong. It is not the style of Anotah Potter, it is the style of another Potter.

..pardon?
- Another Potter, not Anotah Potter. Hughtonball is boom, boom, boom. Potterball is schwap schwap BAM. You know? I like schwap better. But maybe boom is preferable right now. It is easier. Though we have no Shane Duffy, he is Irish.

... ok... Is this the squad we could expect for the forseeable future?
- Yes. Some players are out injured, but this is pretty much the core. I might consult the NSC to see if there is any obvious ones I missed out on.

The NSC?
- Yes. The NSC. Bozza, you know. Bozzas place.

What are you hoping to achieve in these two first games?
- We need to win. The people need joy. I predict there will be a virus in three years killing thousands, millions! of people. So we need some joy.


After another couple of minutes of questions, the press conference ended. Reportedly, half of the journalists went straight to their therapists after leaving the room.

 

[Dorset Seagull]

I must be honest, this is growing on me. Can we expect a youtube channel?

 

[Swansman]

I must be honest, this is growing on me. Can we expect a youtube channel?

Ye I think I will make videos from the World Cup games (if we get there...)

 

[Swansman]

August 2017, World Cup qualifiers

England - Slovakia



As it takes time for a team to learn a tactic and Slovakia is a very difficult opponent, we have decided to go with a pretty barbaric type of football for the first game. The plan is to hoof it to Burn and hope he wins us the ball or otherwise try to win the ball quickly wherever it lands.

The left side looks a bit empty but Sidwell will be man marking their AMR so hopefully they wont get too much space on the wing.

But...

England - Slovakia 1-2
0-1 Adam Zrelak (44)
0-2 Marek Hamsik (79)
1-2 Elliott Bennett (90+3)

Lets just be honest here... it was a terrible performance. Skrtel killed off our "hoof it to Burn" strategy and the midfield looked miserable against theirs, with Hamsik dominating the game.

The game was pretty eventless until the dying minutes of first half, when Slovakia strolled down the empty right wing and put a cross to their striker who scored with some ease.

Second half was no better and Slovakia had plenty of opportunities to score. On top of it, Barry got a red card. Once they made 2-0, it started to look better for us but it was already too late. Bennett who came on and looked lively reduced in the end, but our first game ended in a well-deserved defeat.

England - Slovenia



Prior to the the Slovenia game we decided to make some changes. Dan Burn, head of the players inofficial advisory board (he cute), suggested "maybe a bit more hoofing". It sounded like a great idea.

Instead of risking getting eaten by some central defender, lets just have hoofing alternatives from left to right. We also decided "feck the no left-back idea" and put Goldson there.

England - Slovenia 3-0

1-0 Jan Oblak own goal (59)
2-0 Jake Forster-Caskey (75)
3-0 Steve Cook (90)

The first half must have been one of the most boring ones in the history of international football.

Either the hoofing quality was poor, or Glenn was running offside. It got a little better in the last fifteen of the first half, when Burn got injured and replaced with the less hoofable but better hoofhitting Dean Cox.

By half-time we were pretty tired of watching Glenn run offside and decided to sub him for Conor Chaplin.
1-0 came with one hour played as Matt Clarkes excellent pressure forced a very weird back pass to Oblak that the worldie keeper couldnt deal with in a decent way. 1-0 through a nice own-goal.

We made our third sub as Dale Stephens randomly tackled some poor Slovenian with the ball being about 50 meters away, fearing he would get a red sooner rather than later. We replaced him with Jake Caskey-Forster, a change that would also lead us to dominating the game.

It was also Jake who scored 2-0 when he curled in a dirty free kick and in the dying minutes Steve Cook scored 3-0 from a corner by Dean Cox.
3-0 and the crowd got the sense that maybe, just maybe, football was coming home. Again.


It may not look like it but mr Anotah Potter was happy with the result - wins against Malta & Lithuania in the final two qualifying games will be enough to secure the World Cup spot

 

[GT49er]

I think I'll stick with witty banter from those nice chaps in Leeds .....................................

 

[Braggfan]

I particularly like the forthright predictions for the future of the world in the press conference. Anotah Potter offering more than just footballing insights.

 

[Swansman]

I particularly like the forthright predictions for the future of the world in the press conference. Anotah Potter offering more than just footballing insights.

Bit like Glenn Hoddle

 

[Braggfan]

Bit like Glenn Hoddle

My favourite story about Anotah Potter, is when a group of Leeds fans turned up outside his house to free Ben White, and Potter opened the door holding a hand grenade and threatened to pull the pin if they didn’t leave.

 

[Dick Swiveller]

I am still not sure if this makes smoking weed seem like a good or a bad thing.

 

[Mellotron]

This is enjoyably insane.

 

[Seagull27]

I'm hooked.

I feel the FM20 or FM21 versions may have a better chance though.

Sent from my Pixel 3a using Tapatalk

 

[Swansman]

October 2017, World Cup qualifiers

Two wins and the World Cup spot would be secured. Do you think you can make it?
- It is Malta and Lithuania. These are not a good side. We will Potterball them. Learning experience. Improvement.

You selected three new players for the squad - Craig Noone, Solly March and Sam Baldock. Will you give them a chance?
- Yes. Sam Baldock is. Craig Noone will soon be known as Craig Someone. As for Solly he was always going to be a part of the squad once healthy. His weaknesses will be hidden against this type of oppostion.

What would those weaknesses be?
- He doesnt really do anything. But I think against Malta he could.

You left Dan Burn out despite giving him an important role in the first games. How come?
- I forgot to call him. But he will be back.

Raheem Sterling was complaining in the media...
- Yes, he is a bit of a **** isnt he.

Well.. some question your Brighton philosophy. Care to tell what it is really about?
- No. In the great words of Johan Cruijff: if I wanted you to understand, I would have explained it better.

Malta - England 1-3



We wanted the team to score a lot of goals against Malta and started with a very attacking philosophy and also starting with 16 year old Dan Cashman, hoping he would get a dirty good start to his England career.

Straight from the beginning things were looking very worrying.

Some immediate indicators showed that our fellas was not really up for the tiki-taka stuff no matter the opposition. We lost the ball everywhere and Malta had plenty of dangerous counters, forcing Stockdale to make some saves
.
Up front we had the Glenn Murray issue.

Assistant manager Steve Holland had kept a low profile since day one, arguably afraid of getting fired due to having no connection to Brighton. But after 30 minutes he had to say something.
- Sir mister your majesty Anotah Potter, shall I prepare it?
- Yes, Steve, yes you shall.

By half time the result was 0-0.

While I was yelling at the players - "Anotah Potter demands MOOORE. BETTER", Steve Holland took Murray into a different room, showing him a Powerpoint presentation on the basics of the offside rule.

Ten minutes into the second half, Malta scored from a corner. We made our first changes: Cashman and Noone out, Barnes and Rosenior in.

A few minutes later, we managed to equalise. Elphick hit a great pass to March on the flank, March crossed it and Murray headed it into the post. On the rebound, Barnes put it in the net.

From that point it was all England. Ten minutes after the equaliser, Elphick played another sick pass to March on the left wing, and March crossed it to Murray who this time managed to score his first England goal. He ran out on the sideline to hug Steve Holland.
- If only someone told me this 46 years ago! he said.

In the dying minutes of the game, Forster-Caskey delivered one of his dirty set pieces to Steve Cook who scored on a header. It wasnt the best of games, but we got the three points and that was all that matters.

England - Lithuania 1-0


A bit wrong as Stephens actually played in midfield

Against Lithuania we decided to start with another midfielder instead of a third striker. Perhaps this starting eleven could be considered our best at the moment: Stockdale in goal, a backline with Elphick, Dunk and Cook, a midfield five of Cox and March on the flanks and Stephens, Forster-Caskey and Barry centrally and Murray and Barnes up front.

Make no mistake, the win seems small but we completely dominated the game. 26 shots, 60% possession and overall very nice football - just some problems scoring.

The first half ended 0-0 but we felt we would always score. And just as that feeling was about to evaporate, Dean Cox hit a free-kick that found Steve Cooks head.
3 goals in 4 international caps for Steve Cook. "Your father", Potter said to him after the game. "He got some gooood sperm man. Good sperm".

And more important than the sperm of Steve Cooks father: England had qualified for the World Cup 2018.
Just like in another dimension.

Simon Kuper, the journalist, wrote after the qualification:
"I used to see my relation to the English national team as a dysfunctional love affair. Now it is more the feeling of being both the reciever and the giver of a deep, slow sodomy: it is painful and nasty, but also a certain, almost unmentionable satisfaction. And after all, what is football? Is it sex or is it love? I for one look forward to see Jake Forster-Caskey in the World Cup."