The atmosphere in the boardroom was jubilant, the walls echoing with laughter and congratulations as Patrick Eagles, the manager of Notts County, entered to a round of applause. The club’s promotion to League 1 had revitalized the team and its supporters. A bottle of champagne stood on the table, and the directors, some wearing club scarves over their suits, raised their glasses to toast his extraordinary leadership. “Patrick,” began Chairman Christoffer Reedtz, grinning broadly, “what you’ve done for this club is nothing short of miraculous. Taking us up with the smallest budget in the league is legendary.”
Patrick accepted the praise graciously, though his mind was already on the challenges ahead. “Thank you, Christoffer. And thank you, everyone,” he said, scanning the room. “It was a team effort. The players, the staff, and the fans all believed in the vision. But now that we’re up, the hard work really begins. League 1 is a whole different level, and we’ll need reinforcements to compete.”
Christoffer exchanged a glance with Managing Director, Joe Palmer, and the room grew quieter. “Patrick,” Christoffer said carefully, setting his glass down, “we have complete faith in you to guide us through next season, but I need to be honest with you. The financial reality hasn’t changed much, even with the promotion. The coffers are still tight, and there won’t be a significant budget for transfers or wages.”
Patrick’s face remained impassive, but the weight of the statement hung heavily in the air. “No budget?” he asked, his voice calm but probing. “Christoffer, we’re stepping into a league where the competition is fierce, and some teams have resources we can’t dream of. I’m proud of what we’ve achieved, but it is going to be extremely tough for the same squad to survive without strengthening.”
Joe Palmer leaned forward, his tone conciliatory. “We understand, Patrick, and we’re not blind to the challenges. But the club’s long-term stability has to come first. We’ll do our best to secure loans and free transfers and we are already looking at securing an affiliation with a strong Premier League club to help us bring in some free young but talented additions. We’re asking you to work the same magic as this season. The board trusts your ability to inspire and get the best out of what we have.” Patrick nodded slowly, his mind already strategizing, but the truth was clear: the road ahead would be even tougher than the one behind.
Football Manager Focus
Promotion to league 1 is in the bag at the first attempt!
A squad lacking in depth of quality led to key players playing a LOT of minutes of football for Notts and this inevitably led to an insane injury crisis over the Christmas and New Year period. With a couple of new recruits coming in and resorting to regular resting of jaded players after pretty much every single match thereon, the ship was steadied for an impressive run of wins to see us win the league as highest goal scorers.
A distinct lack of pace in the centre back options meant we were not able to keep as many clean sheets as we’d like but our defensive and possession stats meant we finished in the top 3 in key areas including expected goals conceded, fewest goals conceded and most possession. A very successful debut season at Notts County for Patrick Eagles, achieved while staying true to his principles of defensive solidity through good teamwork while pleasing the board and fans alike with possession based attacking football.
Macaulay Langstaff finished as the league 2 top goal scorer with an impressive 30 goals. Two of these came in the final 2-0 away win against Forest Green Rovers, a result that saw an exciting finish to the season with Notts rising above Stockport who drew 3-3 away to Wrexham. Travesty would come though in the new season with both Langstaff and Matt Palmer handing in transfer requests.
Palmer went to league 1 rivals Lincoln City for 800k. This is huge money for Notts but only saw 80k go towards the transfer kitty. With the club already narrowly exceeding the allowed allocation for player wages, there was no room to add anything more to the zero amount available to sign new players. We had to think smart and quickly.
New recruits
With no plans to make any tactical changes for the new season ahead, the focus was on adding a new defensive midfielder to replace Matt Palmer, to improve the goalkeeping options and to keep an eye on striker options should Langstaff attract a club willing to meet his 1.5 million valuation.
We started by signing Matt Macey, a commanding goalkeeper highly recommended by our scouts as an upgrade on Stone. This meant we now had much better strength of depth in this position.
We offered a trial to Michal Rosiak, a deep lying defensive playmaker released by Arsenal. Despite the young age of 18, he fit the club DNA very well, strong with his teamwork, passing and composure. As a player who will continue to improve, it was a no brainer to bring him in on a free to add options in the midfield area. Being able to play at right back too made him an attractive addition to the squad. With a slight weakness in his positioning, he’s not an Eagles regular starter but will be interesting to see how he develops.
After Rosiak, there was alarmingly zero money left to offer in wages for free or loan signings. We had to get creative if we wanted to add much needed depth to a squad very low in numbers. With his stock rising, it was time for Eagles to approach the board with some demands that could potentially help the situation and get the ball rolling to improve the clubs facilities and ability to attract and develop youth players. A request to improve the youth facilities was accepted, as was a request to look at setting up an affiliation with a club from a higher division. This led to proposals to create a link with one of Leicester or Tottenham. We suggested the latter and this was quickly set up.
This was a very positive move that led to us bringing in Will Andiyapan, Dante Cassanova and Alfie Devine, all on free loan deals requiring zero wage contribution.
Andiyapan adds adequate cover for both the left back and centre back positions as an aggressive left footed ball winner. Cassanova is a defensively sound option at right back who is flexible enough to add another decent option in defensive midfield also. Alfie Devine is a real coup for Notts County as a plyer with huge potential to play in the Premier league. He will be an upgrade on Matt Palmer with the ability to easily slot into the Regista role. It may be tempting to explore the possibility of utilising his attacking playmaking skills further up the pitch.
Youth candidates
The quality of our youth intake is promising, with 6 highly rated players singing to our U-18s team. Of course this will be rated against the level of our current squad in league 2 so it is difficult to judge how this will translate to football in league 1.
Matthew Francis certainly has early strengths in the right places to develop into a quality threat in the final third, either out wide or as a striker, although we’d need to see a significant rise in his finishing for the latter. Hopefully some good form for the U-18s can help build on his currently low self belief. He certainly has the trickery and decent pace to succeed with 14 flair and 12 technique highlighting an ability to excite and make things happen on the ball. That combined with a solid first touch of 11 and 9 passing make him an exciting prospect to keep an eye on.
Josh Smith already has impressive ball winning attributes with 15 aggression, 13 bravery and 14 tackling. With 14 positioning he could be set for an early rise to Eagle’s first team squad in the future. At 6’3″ with a jumping reach of 14 he has the promise to be strong in the air. Particularly excited to see how he progresses and hopeful we could have a home grown commanding centre-back on our hands here. That is while hoping his determination of 1 is not too detrimental to his development.
Interestingly there were rumours of a potential take over at Notts but this was rapidly squashed by the current owners. It will be really interesting to see how last seasons tactics performs in a higher league. A quick glance at the squad comparison report shows we can compete on the ball and mentally but have a particular weakness in the air with a lack of height and heading/jumping ability. We will continue to rely on our ability therefore to keep possession of the ball and limit opposition chances both in our final third and from set-pieces.
We are predicted to finish 13th, comfortably avoiding relegation. Can Eagles achieve more? I suspect keeping key players free from injury will be key to any success in the season ahead!