Hold on. What’s this? A new Football Manager 2020 story? But Christopher, I thought you had decided to skip FM20?
Well… there’s this huge pandemic going on right now (you might have heard or read about it), and pretty much all sport has been halted. With football on hold, those lovely folks at Sports Interactive have made FM20 free to download and play until 3:00pm BST on Wednesday 1 April.
While FM20 is free-to-play, I’ve been playing a short-term challenge save, which I’m documenting right here on Fuller FM. I’ve simulated through half a season and have taken over the team that’s bottom of the Premier League, with the aim of saving them from relegation. And that team is…
…Leicester City! Nah, just kidding. It’s Burnley. The title kinda gives it away, doesn’t it?
Anyway, I hope you’ll enjoy reading this little FM20 adventure. Let’s get started…
INTRODUCTION
It’s 23 December 2019. We’re nearly halfway through the Premier League campaign, and we’re right in the thick of the festive season… but there’s not much Christmas spirit to be found at Turf Moor.
Despite having stayed clear of the drop zone in recent years (even qualifying for Europe the season before last), it’s all gone wrong for Burnley lately. They’re bottom of the league, are six points adrift of safety, and have only one win to their name. That was away from home against fellow strugglers Sheffield United, whose in-game exploits under Chris Wilder haven’t quite matched up with reality.
Further up the table, you’ll find Manchester City leading the way just ahead of Liverpool, who have a game in hand. Arsenal have fared surprisingly well, but the biggest shock is that West Ham are FIFTH! I bet Karren Brady doesn’t want the season to be cancelled now!
Looking at Burnley’s results, it’s not hard to see where they’ve faltered. Defensively, the Clarets aren’t too shabby, but their attackers are as dangerous as a pair of mittens. They’ve scored just nine PL goals this seasons, and their most prolific scorers in the competition have two each. TWO.
Sean Dyche’s position had been under threat for a while now, but the 2-0 home reverse against Wolves – which stretched their end-of-year losing streak to five games – was the final straw. After the game, chairman Mike Garlick and the Clarets board decided to stop funding their manager’s earthworm diet and instead end his seven-year reign.
The gravel-voiced ‘Ginger Mourinho’ was gone, and in his place came… erm… the ‘Romford Owen Coyle’. Some Burnley fans weren’t too convinced.
To be fair, I think Darcie’s been reading about all my glorious failures at Shrewsbury on FM19. Just to ease some of her fears, I’ve no plans to bring Lee Angol to Turf Moor. Yet.
Being from the other side of the country, though, I perhaps needed someone to help me acquaint myself with this historic Lancashire club. I thought I’d follow FM Stag‘s lead, and hire a glamorous assistant from the local area.
My first choice was Gemma Atkinson. You know… Cristiano Ronaldo’s ex. Her off “Hollyoaks”, “Emmerdale” and “Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3”. Unfortunately, it turned out she’s actually from Bury, not Burnley, so that was a non-starter.
I then turned to another of my teenage celebrity crushes – Nikki Sanderson, aka Candice Stowe from “Coronation Street”. Then I realised… she was born in Blackpool.
After ruling out anyone else who was from a different Lancastrian town beginning with the letter ‘B’, I eventually struck gold at the 17th attempt. So let’s meet my new advisor – and Burnley super-fan – the lovely…
…[sigh] Alastair Campbell. Well, if Burnley get relegated, at least I have someone who can put a positive spin on it.
SQUAD REPORT
There’s the state of our first-team squad, sorry as it is. It’s probably not a good sign that my assistant manager Ian Woan only rates a handful of players as being of a decent Premier League. The rest are apparently Championship-level, if not worse…
Anyway, I’m now going to look at each senior player one-by-one, as well as posting screenshots of those I feel will be most important to us.
It wasn’t long ago that Burnley had three England international goalkeepers at their disposal. With Tom Heaton now at Aston Villa, Nick Pope has established himself as the Clarets’ new number 1. He’s cool-headed, commanding and has great reflexes – just what I want from a shotstopper.
Joe Hart is now a pale shadow of his old 75-cap self, and the error-prone 32-year-old has been reduced to bench-warming duties. He might not even be doing that soon, as former Leeds youngster Bailey Peacock-Farrell is developing nicely in our Under-23s.
Leading our defenders is captain Ben Mee, who has made close to 300 league appearances in claret-and-blue since 2011. This no-nonsense centre-half is very consistent and doesn’t waste much time on the ball. I am, though, a little concerned about his ‘Dives Into Tackles’ trait.
That trait is also shared by Ben Gibson – a resolute ball-playing defender who’s surprisingly only made six appearances this season. A much calmer man in the tackle is James Tarkowski, who has been ever-present at the back for Burnley this season. We also have Kevin Long, who’s about to celebrate a decade at Turf Moor.
Charlie Taylor is the most gifted of our full-back options. The 26-year-old’s athleticism, work rate and strong tackling serve him well on the left flank. Erik Pieters is currently Taylor’s understudy, but the ex-Netherlands international has played only sparingly this season and wants to go out on loan in January.
On the right flank, you’ll find Matt Lowton, who’s very composed and also has a high work ethic. Then there’s 34-year-old Phil Bardsley – a Premier League stalwart who’s way past his best, hence he’s made just two appearances this season (both in the League Cup).
Vice-captain Jack Cork is one of the undisputed stars of this team. A brave and committed midfielder who never runs out of energy, he can be used in either a holding role or as a box-to-box player. (Oh, and has anyone mentioned that his dad is the follically-challenged Wimbledon legend Alan Cork?)
Speaking of quality box-to-box midfielders, Danny Drinkwater has been the Clarets’ best player this season, getting an average match rating of 7.08 across 19 games. The former Leicester man has a thigh strain, and his half-season loan from Chelsea expires early next month, so I might not even get a chance to use him. Shame.
Deep-lying playmaker Ashley Westwood is perhaps our most creative central midfielder, possessing a keen eye for a killer ball. Jeff Hendrick is also an attractive player to watch on his day, though the Irish box-to-box midfielder’s recent form has been disappointing.
We now come to Dwight McNeil – one of the few Burnley youth players to successfully graduate to the first-team. The energetic England Under-21s left-winger broke through as a 19-year-old last season, though he only has two goals and zero assists so far this term. We’ll need to make the most of his precocious talents to turn our fortunes around.
If Dwight’s poor form continues, we can turn to a more experienced head in Robbie Brady. Capped 50 times by the Republic of Ireland, the versatile workhorse can play anywhere on the left flank.
Usually starting on the right wing is Jóhann Berg Guðmundsson – an Icelandic left-footer with a fine long-range shot who loves to cut inside. We also have former England winger Aaron Lennon, who’s probably on his last little legs as a Premier League force.
To finish off, we have four powerful centre-forwards who all play similar roles and complement each other well. Though he’s only netted once in 21 outings this season, I rate Ashley Barnes as the best of them. He’s a fearless and cocky frontman who could yet match his 12-goal PL haul from last term should he click into gear.
With three goals to his name, our most ‘in-form’ striker – if you can call him that – is New Zealander Chris Wood. The spirited 28-year-old plays with his back to goal and can hold the ball up very well, hence he’s most suited to a target man role.
Ex-Burnley youth graduate Jay Rodriguez – who rejoined the club from West Brom this summer – is a versatile but somewhat injury-prone forward. Lastly, there’s our Czech penalty king Matej Vydra – a calm finisher who can clean up in the Championship but, it seems, not at this level.
Tactics-wise, I’ll be largely sticking to the club’s philosophies of playing direct and defensively-solid football. One of the systems I’ll be using is this counter-attacking 4-3-3.
It might take some trial and error to figure out how best to set up the three-man midfield, so that we’re responsible defensively while still being able to cause problems on the break. I’ll also need to figure out whether Jóhann would be better suited as an inverted winger (a role I’ve rarely used on FM) or an inside-forward (which I’m much more familiar with).
And as it wouldn’t be a wise idea to make a complete break from the old regime, here’s a 4-4-bleeping-2. It won’t be pretty, but it’ll get results. I hope.
This is the system I’m using for my first match – at home to the only team we haven’t yet faced in the Premier League this term. And that team is… Manchester City.
Yikes. Now that’s a baptism of fire.
BURNLEY vs MANCHESTER CITY (Premier League – Match 19)
So, Burnley were dead-last in the PL and on a five-game losing run. Manchester City were top, having taken 13 points from their last five matches. Can you guess what happened when these teams met at Turf Moor?
That’s right. It wasn’t a contest – at least not after the first 20 minutes, anyway.
City gave us a couple of scares early on, eventually breaking through after 24 minutes. With Sergio Agüero pressing him deep in his box, Taylor showed as much urgency and composure as Donald Trump during a health crisis. When our left-back eventually cleared the ball, Raheem Sterling knocked it down for David Silva to drill in a 25-yarder.
The Citizens’ departing midfield maestro nearly scored again five minutes later, but he screwed namesake Bernardo Silva’s deflected centre wide. That could’ve been a big moment, as could a big equalising opportunity that came Cork’s way just before half-time. McNeil’s flick-on was volleyed goalwards by Cork, who unfortunately clipped the post.
We wouldn’t seriously threaten the champions again. They were all over us again in the second half, with Pope having to catch an early header from John Stones. The England defender would be back with a vengeance much later on.
We’d done well to restrict City to just one goal with a little over five minutes remaining. That was until their pair of Silvas produced assists for their pair of centre-halves. Firstly, Bernardo’s 85th-minute free-kick was nodded in by Nicolás Otamendi. Then, in stoppage-time, Stones got behind our defence to flick David’s free-kick past Pope.
3-0 to Manchester City. No surprises on my first day in the job.
After that Boxing Day encounter, our players looked like they’d gone through six rounds with Anthony Joshua, and then another six with Tyson Fury. And with less than a 48-hour turnaround until our next game, I had some big decisions ahead.
WATFORD vs BURNLEY (Premier League – Match 20)
In truth, I never expected us to pick up any points against City. It was much more important that we got something from this relegation six-pointer at Vicarage Road against second-from-bottom Watford.
Hendrick was still exhausted after Boxing Day, and Drinkwater was not quite ready to play, so that left us a bit short of midfield options. I gave a Premier League debut to 21-year-old reserve playmaker Adam Phillips, though it was his more experienced partner Westwood who came good for us early on.
Less than four minutes into proceedings, a foul on McNeil gave us a free-kick close to goal. Westwood swung it in from the right, and Tarkowski got through a crowd of black-and-yellow shirts to head in the opener.
Alas, we couldn’t hold onto our early lead. Phillips’ naivety was evident when in the 25th minute, when Watford playmaker Will Hughes ghosted past him before having a shot at goal. The ball deflected off both Lowton and Tarkowski before falling to Argentine winger Roberto Pereyra, who applied a simple finish.
The Hornets threatened to sting us again before the break. Pope held his nerve to catch a header from home captain Troy Deeney before denying Pereyra a brace, thus keeping the half-time score at 1-1.
After surviving an early second-half corner from Watford, we tried to hit them on the break. McNeil took the ball deep inside our half and dribbled all the way to the opposition’s penalty area, where he run out of steam and gave Ben Foster a very easy save. How we would curse that missed opportunity.
Though a rested Hendrick replaced a nervy Phillips midway through the second period, the momentum was firmly with our opponents. They got a crucial stroke of luck in the 77th minute, when Taylor deflected a Gerard Deulofeu shot towards Deeney, who beat Pope at his near post to seal the points.
Another day, another defeat for Burnley, whose survival hopes were looking even grimmer. With Watford having pulled themselves out of the bottom three, we were now seven points adrift of safety.
If the scale of the predicament I face at Burnley wasn’t obvious already, it definitely is now.
I’ll have to bring some fresh blood to Turf Moor in the January window. It might even be time to move the team away from Dyche’s old-school tactics to something like the vertical tiki-taka I used at Fiorentina on FM19. Think “Fullerball: Post-Brexit Edition”…
…or maybe not. I’m guessing Jo Swinson became Prime Minister in a parallel universe that’s somehow even more bizarre than the one we actually live in. Still, I suppose my new advisor’s quite happy with that particular result.
So what did you make of this first chapter? Do Burnley have what it takes to stay up? Feel free to leave a comment below if you so wish.
I’ll be back next Monday with another chapter, where I’ll go through the transfer window and try to rebuild this team. If you want to stay updated when any new posts go live, please hit the ‘Follow Fuller FM’ button and/or follow me on Twitter @Fuller_FM.
Until next time, keep calm, stay safe – and remain indoors.
Fuller FM 
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