Hi Guys and Girls,

So I decided to skip my history post and dive straight into the start of my game story as I’ve had time to play this week for once!

Intro – Why Forest?

Okay so as the title suggests I’ve decided to go ahead and pick Nottingham Forest for my first career. I almost always try to pick a Championship team who will contend for the title, with a decent squad and a little bit of a transfer budget for me to play with (Burnley and Southampton last year for example).

Forest mainly fit into this category, I was given a very healthy £6 million as a transfer budget – although with an already stretched wage budget I have had to reduce this a bit.

Expectations for us were pretty modest, with a media prediction of 14th so at least I should get a bit of leeway if results start going against us.

Squad Analysis – Deadwood and holes to fill

First and foremost, this squad needs wingers. Forest start with James Coppinger (on loan) and perhaps Andy Reid as the only wide players… I’ve seen quicker tectonic shift than these two. First port of call will definitely be to invest in this area.

Fullbacks. Dan Harding (ex-Southampton, he wasn’t good enough for me there and he’s not good enough for me here either) isn’t great at left-back and the right-back options aren’t much better with Sam Hutchinson (on loan from Chelsea), Maloney and Greg Halford on offer.

Apart from these areas we’re not looking too bad really, a new defensive midfielder and a decent goalkeeper would be good although not essential. There are some definite star players in Lewis McGugan, Danny Collins and Simon Cox which should be a good core for the team this season.

One worrying thing to note is the age of the squad. With few youth prospects, an empty under 18s team and most of the starting 11 over the age of 27 there is definite investment needed here.

Transfer Ins Outs and Targets

Okay, so far it’s been a bit of a mixed bag in the transfer market really… I’ve managed to shed a bit of the dead wood but my only real successes in bringing players in have been through free transfers…

Players In:

Michel Salgado: Free – We needed a new right back and he’s a golden oldie with plenty of experience which should help in the Championship.

Fabio Grosso: Free – More experience at left back and is a huge improvement on Harding. Like Salgado, joined on a one year deal on very low wages.

Cristiano Zanetti: Free – A different option at DM, a bit more quality than Guy Moussi and at the very least will provide decent cover.

Ricardo Rocha: Free – Brought in purely as back-up for my main guys, if he plays more than 5 games I’d be surprised but almost all of his wages are in as appearance fees (Michael Owen-esque) so he’s some very cheap cover.

Shaun Derry: £140K – He was thrown up on the transfer list and he was too good to turn down. Another leader (along with Salgado) and comes in ranked as my best CM.

Hogan Ephraim: Loan – Another QPR player and offers some insurance if I can’t buy in someone better.

So a lot of old players on short contracts here, hopefully enough experience to push me towards promotion… Definitely need to invest purely in youth now though, hopefully I’ll find a wonderkid or two.

Players Out:

Marcus Tudgay: £550K to Huddersfield. Not my sort of striker at all and no real need for him when all my tactics only play one man up front.

Brendan Maloney: £450K to Burnley. Not good enough to start for the team and I have plenty of cover at right back now.

Radoslaw Majewski: £2.6M to Wolves. Again surplus to requirements and with such a big price tag was too valuable not to get rid of.

Matthew Regan: Loan to York. Young and not going to get a look in with me.

I have managed to generate some funds getting rid of these players and all players who would never have got in my starting team.

Pre-Season Friendlies

Okay so I’ve got through my pre-season games now with pretty good results. The defense has been a bit leaky but there has been a decent number of goals scored at the other end to keep the results strong.

The results against Olympiakos and Villarreal were really strong and that was whilst playing a weakened team. Only a blip against Genoa marks the results list, it was a very disappointing performance but it was a very weakened team (due to fitness) and Genoa were relatively strong. We still managed the majority of possession and a strong second half prevented the score from worsening.

Looking forward.

So after a strong pre-season I think we’re set up pretty well for the opening games of the season. We need a few more young signings to shake up the team a bit and build for the next seasons and I definitely want to tweak the tactics to try to shore up the defense a bit.

The next blog will focus on my first few league and cup games and I’ll also go into proper details on my tactics.

As a parting thought I’ll leave a link to a fantastic goal from Greg Halford. Apologies for the poor quality, I have now learnt to upload in full HD!!