A Football Manager Career

41: Reclaiming the Title

We had now failed to win the league two seasons in a row and I knew that we had to focus all our energies on getting the title back. And of course on winning the Carabao Cup so we could chase down that Liverpool record. And of course the Champions Cup because I really loved that trophy. Oh, and first up we had the small matter of the Club World Championship to open our 2053/54 campaign. To this day I am still not sold with the Championship being staged during the off-season and disrupting our break, but nonetheless it's a cup and I of course wanted it. What's more, we were given yet another opportunity to show the world that England was in the hands of the North West with us facing Chelsea in the Quarters. It took a little longer than we wanted as once again we were involved in an incredibly boring match. However, I brought on Prevost at the end of the 90 minutes and he finally broke the deadlock for us with a beautiful long-range strike on the 94th minute to get us the win. Beautifully this meant that we progressed not just to the Semis, but to a game against Troy Deeney's Bayern Munich. Following the continual stream of trophies I had won since being at United he was no longer breathing down my neck in the rankings. However, he was still my only competition in the Hall of Fame with us the only two managers in the top 5 of all time who weren't retired: Him fifth and me third with Sir Alex Ferguson in-between in a United threesome. Pep, of course, was still smugly on top. 

It was a big and symbolic game and he won it. The rivalry was reignited and my summer blues were increased yet further.

Fortunately, we had two fantastic opportunities at the start of the season to get things back on track: The Community Shield against Burnley, and the Euro. Super Cup against... Burnley. Once again they had spent a fortune, whilst we hadn't spent a penny in the summer with a lot of funds instead improving our training and youth facilities. Also, we had spent a load the previous season and I was very happy with the side. But yes, Burnley. They had spent yet another two hundred million in the summer and had now spent well over half a billion in four years and they genuinely had a quality squad which was a true rival to our own. Furthermore, Dwight Gayle had proved himself to be an incredibly canny operator. He had only spent two years in the England post and yet he achieved the same as me in almost six years in the job: A World Cup win. Following the cup, he resigned to return to club management and ended up in Germany, like myself and Troy. He was at a 'best of the rest' side as opposed to a genuinely competitive side like us, however he still achieved a Euro Cup win with Borussia M'gladbach before, like me, returning to England. He was easily the third best English manager of the age. Despite their millions and their manager, they weren't a match for us in the Community Shield and we brushed them aside 1-0 at Wembley thanks to a lovely counter attacking move finished off by my Brazilian Falcao. Due to their millions and their manager they were a match for us in Norway at the Lerkendal stadium with them brushing us aside 1-0 thanks to a lovely counter attacking move finished off by the World Cup winning Englishman Kyle Morrison. 

Clearly it was going to be an incredibly tight title race and I was pumped for the prospect of such a close fight in the year ahead.

Whilst it was indeed tight between us, the rest of the league had seemingly fallen far below our standards. Indeed, it took until the tenth game for a team to even score against us with us having won all nine and having scored twenty-four goals already. It took a further four more games for us to drop any points with Leeds annoyingly holding us to a 0-0 draw despite them having two players sent off! To this day I still don't know how we failed to win and their cunning Chris Milton, yet another fellow England manager, managed to get a point that day. Regardless, we went into December flying high and overflowing with joyous confidence.

Predictably, ever so predictably, that's where we came crashing down in a disastrous three games where our pride was not just punctured, but pummelled to oblivion mercilessly by the three defining rivals of my recent management. On the 3rd we lost 1-0 at Stamford Bridge. On the 13th we lost 2-1 at The Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. On the 26th we lost 1-0 at Turf Moor. We won our other games that month, but these nine points were devastating and we went into 2054 second in the league with Gayle's men sitting smugly atop the pack.