Interview with Chris Gillman, manager of Beggarwood Athletic

Our roving reporter met up with Chris Gillman, the Beggarwood Athletic manager, at the end of his first season to ask him about the tactical side to his rise through the FML rankings.

Chris, your team is rising up the world rankings. How much do you think your unusual 4231 formation is helping to improve your team’s fortunes?
CG I'd like to think it has played a fairly significant part. We had seemed to hit a bit of a wall with what we were playing before so I decided to play to what I thought would best accommodate my best players.

How did you decide upon your current formation? Did you look at the players at your disposal and build a formation around that, or did you start with a formation and recruit a team around it?
CG It was a mixture of both to be honest. I could see that I just wasn't creating enough goals with my old formation, and it was clear to be that my wingers we my weak link. I was also inspired by Liverpool's current formation, but I knew that I had to narrow it as I knew that my players weren't quite of the caliber of Torres and Gerrard and so I wouldn't score enough goals with the level of width Liverpool play with. As a Benitez style tactic, it's been a far more successful attempt to recreate his work that anything I've managed in any of the offline versions of the game. And when I saw that El-Hadji Diouf was available, it swung my decision to change my tactics as I felt he was likely to be a perfect fit!

As a Liverpool fan you must have been pleased to bag a former Anfield player. As your record signing, how is El-Hadji Diouf, is he faring at the The Warren?
CG Diouf has been a great signing for me. He's averaged over 7 for me in all games and his 6 competitive matches have resulted in an average rating of 7.36. I've not had a lot of opportunity to play him where I've wanted to yet as he filled in at AMC while my first choice was injured for a week and since he's gone up front he's suffered from injury himself. He's due back later this evening though and I'm looking forward to trying him out with my other off-season signings.

El-Hadji Diouf - stylish

Without wanting you to divulge your tactical secrets, playing two midfielders in a defensive position and three in an attacking position, how do you cope with a lack of wide players?
CG Most of the time, we cope okay. Having two defensive midfielders allows my fullbacks the freedom to get forward without leaving me too exposed at the back.

With most of the top teams playing a form of 451, how do your tactics deal with that formation? And are you confident of breaking into the higher reaches of the gameworld rankings?
CG I haven't come across a lot of teams that play 451, it has to be said, although I suspect that this is because I'm not high enough in the rankings yet. At home, I have narrowed my pitch in an attempt to stifle teams that play with a lot of width and away there are a few tweaks to be made to help us to cope. I'd like to think that we are capable to reaching the upper regions of the ranking eventually. I'm confident that the tactics are fully capable of it, but I'm well aware that with my current squad of players we are still a long way off the pace.

Before you settled on your 4231, what previous formations did you try? How successful were these attempts?
CG I've only really played with one other formation. I only had one decent forward in my initial squad so I played a 4-5-1 with a DM, an ML a MR and two AMCs. It worked well, up to a point. We were solid defensively but just couldn't score enough goals to progress beyond a certain level. I was very proud to win the mover of the week award in my first week, gaining 533 places but we levelled off after this and the lack of goals really began to hit home in the league. We ended up finishing 5th but with the second best defensive record conceding just 29 goals in my 38 matches but I was frustrated by numerous 1-0 defeats in matches that I ought to be winning! Changing to my new tactic late in the season brought me 8 wins, a draw and a defeat to the champion's CarTOON United in my last 10 matches, which was very satisfying.

Having completed a successful first season in StJohn, had you played in other FML gameworlds before, or just Football Manager before that?
CG This was my first ever look at FML and I'm still getting to grips with some of its nuances. I lost my best defender in a wage auction yesterday as I hadn't fully appreciated quite how it worked, but I'm learning from my mistakes and I'm fully enjoying the experience. I've been with Football Manager since it's reincarnation and the first football management game I owned was CM97/98.

Having joined an older gameworld in its fourth season, what tips do you have to managers considering a move to StJohn?
CG The best tip I can give is to get involved. There is far more to get gained from the game if you're friendly, chatty and sociable. From what I've heard about v1.2 this is going to become a bigger part of the game anyway and I think it's a great decision by SI. I think the blog is a great idea to keep people up to date with GW information and I've enjoyed contributing to it both now and with the AFA articles last season. Another think I can advise is to be honest. There's no substitution for a good reputation and of course, if you get a bad rep it's nigh on impossible to shake, no matter how much you might insist you've reformed.

What can we expect from Beggarwood Athletic in season five?
CG I'm hoping for a rather boring top half finish in the league this season. There are still some changes that I want to make to my squad and I'm not sure how long it's going to take me to plug these gaps. Last season we showed ourselves to be a bit of a cup team and if I get a good draw I'd like to challenge for the Non-Premiership Cup and hopefully get a couple of wins in the AEFA cup too.

Chris, thanks for the interview and best luck in season five!

AFA: Week 1 Summary

So a week of season 4 has passed; let's have a little look at what's been happing in the AFA.

Metalface Mirren top the table, cementing their place there with a classic 5-4 victory over Brainwashed United and ensuring that they will be top, even if CarTOON United win their games in hand. Quite what was passing through manager Mark Brook's mind as he saw his 5-2 lead evaporate late into the second half I don't quite know, but I doubt I would be able to reproduce it in print.

Also pushing for a place near the top are Beggarwood Athletic, proud winners of the the latest mover of the week award. A tight defence has kept them in the running but a disappointing lack of goals has meant that too many draws have crept into their results meaning they will have a real struggle to challenge for the silverware at the end of the season. Beggarwood are also the only side to have progressed in the cup to date: an own goal and a penalty good enough to see them to home and away 1-0 victories over last season's Premiership runners up: JD Legions.

Reigning champions CarTOON United look well placed to mount another serious title challenge. With just one defeat to date and an eyewateringly high total in the "goals for" column, other managers will be doing whatever they can to put off playing them. This one is certainly not looking forward to going to Riverview Park to play his last match of the season.

Looking at the reputation of the AFA, it is not hard to see why our clubs have struggled in the UFFA competitions this year. But despite not managing to pick up a single win to date between our six entrants, the clubs can be proud of their achievements. Metalface Mirren particularly, with their two creditable draws against highly ranked teams, can exit with their heads held high.

Finally, voting for the inaugural AFA goal and blunder of the week competitions has commenced and the competition is fierce in both categories. With goals coming from free kicks, direct from corners, screamers from 25 yards and deft lobs from 40 we really have been spoilt for choice. As for the award that no one wants, well we've seen pass-backs gone awry, stunning own goals, inexplicable dallying on the ball, and rushes of blood to the head that make David James look docile by comparison. With only 5 days allowed for voting, the results should be with us next week...

AFA: Season 4 Preview

So a much slimmed AFA gets underway and it promises to be a competitive one. With last season’s deadwood lost the AFA has been streamlined to a single league and the door has been blown wide open for all comers to challenge for the Premiership title. With last season’s title going right down to the wire, it promises to be an exciting season.

Champions CarTOON United go into the season as slight favourites and having ended the last season 34 games unbeaten few will have looked further at the bookies. Will the pressure be too much? One win in their opening six matches suggests it might be.

Having seen last season’s league title slip away on goal difference, JD Legions will be hoping to go one better but after a pre-season that could be generously described as indifferent he will be hoping that his form turns around quickly. With new signing Rodrigues brought in to bolster the defence they will have taken some encouragement from splitting 6 points with the season’s surprise package Metalface Mirren.

The winners of last season’s first division have started the season brightly; taking 4 points off CarTOON United. Manager Mark Brooks will be hoping his team can make it two league titles in a row and with his much re-shuffled squad.

This season also sees a few exciting new ventures being trialled in the AFA. Firstly in a move never seen before, the official cup now has two legs up to and including the quarter finals. Some say it will never work, but the AFA are brave enough to try. This season has also seen the introduction of a Goal of the Week and Blunder of the Week competition within the FA, and with some great entries already in both competitions, it shows the AFA is more like modern Chelsea-Liverpool games than ones of old, exciting whether its due to brilliance or stupidity.