Bore da! Welcome to the official first chapter of my new Football Manager 2021 journeyman series!
For my latest blog story, I will track the progress of Shama Deadman as he travels across Europe looking to make his name as a football manager. His first job has taken him to Cambrian & Clydach – a small semi-professional club from deep in the Welsh valleys.
I would suggest reading the Prologue if you haven’t already, as that will explain some of the rules that I/Shama must stick to throughout this career. When you’re ready, Shama will introduce you to his new club, as well as some of the players he’ll be managing during these first few months.
CLUB 1: CAMBRIAN & CLYDACH
So this is where my journey begins: Cambrian & Clydach. Or, to give them their full name, Cambrian & Clydach Vale Boys & Girls Club. I’d love to hear Mike West read that out on the BBC’s Final Score!
The club is based in Clydach Vale – a small village of around 3,000 people, located in the Rhondda Valley in south Wales. The village was the site of several collieries in the 19th and 20th centuries, and the coal miner on the club’s badge reflects these strong industrial ties.
The club traces its roots back to the formation of Cambrian United (named after one of those collieries) in 1965. United merged with Clydach Vale B&GC in 2002 to create the club as we know it today. After initially playing in the South Wales Amateur League, they entered the Welsh Football League in 2005.
Back-to-back promotions saw Cambrian reach Division 1 (one level below the Welsh Premier League) in 2007, before winning that league in 2012. The club made more history in 2019, reaching the Welsh League Cup Final after knocking out several WPL teams, including perennial champions The New Saints. Despite a valiant effort, they lost 2-0 to Cardiff Metropolitan University in the Final.
Later in 2019, the Football Association of Wales began restructuring its league system. The WPL was renamed the Cymru Premier, and two new regional leagues – the Cymru North and Cymru South – were formed as part of a new second tier. Cambrian entered the South diivision and were in 4th place when the 2019/2020 season was halted.
The ‘Cam Army’ have been tipped for another top-half finish in 2020/2021. There are 16 teams in the Cymru South, from which the champions will be promoted to the Cymru Premier, and the bottom three will be relegated to the third-tier Ardal Leagues. We also play in two knockout competitions – the Welsh Cup (which offers a Europa Conference League place to the winner), and the Welsh League Cup (which doesn’t).
We play at King George’s New Field, which is also known as the M&P Group 3G stadium for sponsorship reasons. Though it can hold 1,000 spectators, only 250 are allowed in currently, making this the smallest stadium in the Cymru leagues. Making money through gate receipts is going to be a struggle.
We start off with a bank balance of around £9,000, though we’ll inevitably be in the red before long. Our weekly player wage budget is just over £1,100, which is the fifth-highest in the division. I’m not sure how sustainable that is long-term when our ground is so small, so cutting costs may become a priority when the transfer window opens in January. [Remember: I always turn off the first transfer window in new saves.]
At the very least, we do have a very famous fan on our side – former Barcelona, Tottenham and England manager Terry Venables! Believe it or not, El Tel’s mother was originally from Clydach Vale, and he has followed the local team for quite a while, even serving as honorary chairman until a few years ago.
THE SQUAD
So these are the boyos I’ve inherited. You can see that we’re strong in some areas, but there are others where we have very limited options – and there’s more than a little deadwood that needs shifting. Making a cohesive tactic for this squad is going to be a challenge, but before I give that a go, let’s meet some of our main men:
I’ve got a bit of a dilemma in goal. We’re blessed with not one, but two of the best keepers in the division, though they’re at different stages in their careers. Neil Collins is an experienced shotstopper and a strong aerial presence, while Cameron Clarke is a younger, more flexible understudy who is still quite raw technically.
Our other two goalies… are old and useless. Sorry, fellas.
Central defence is another strong area for us. Jarrad Wright and his aptly-named colleague Connor Young are both pretty solid, even if their composure levels do give me cause for concern. Adding extra experience is 36-year-old Mark Crutch – or ‘Crutches’, as I’ve christened him – who combines his playing duties with working as my assistant manager.
Unfortunately, we have very little quality in either full-back position. As far as Welsh-Italians go, Cam Strinati isn’t exactly the Joe Calzaghe of semi-professional football left-backs, though he is certainly very determined. Meanwhile at right-back, we have a couple of 17-year-olds in Chad Goss and Morgan Rowling.
An intelligent and versatile playmaker, Kyle Jones is probably the most talented player in our squad and is already attracting interest from Cymru Premier clubs. Kyle will be our new vice-skipper, serving as understudy to ‘Captain’ Ceri Morgan, who recently returned to Cambrian after seven years at Carmarthen. Our next-best midfielder is 20-year-old ball-winner Dai Thomas, who has the most Welsh name imaginable – and is also half-Scottish.
Former Swansea and Hull trainee Liam Edwards is our only professional player, and one of the most well-rounded attacking midfielders in the division. He’s also on £500 per week, which is nearly half our entire wage budget, so we probably won’t be able to keep him for very long. We’re likely to see a bit more of Lewis Ellis – a pacey, hard-working right-winger who has experienced the giddy heights of the Swedish fourth division.
Though we’ve got plenty of depth on the right flank, we don’t have any left-wingers (which is ironic, seeing as we’re in an old mining village). The left-footed Josh Bull could maybe play that role at a push, but I might decide to use either Edwards or Sam Jones as an inside-forward instead.
Lastly, we come to the strikers. Ryan Prosser is our most natural finisher, having scored six goals in his first five league games for Cambrian after arriving from Merthyr in January. I could partner him with Samuel Johnson, though I’m not sure that an 18th-century writer and lexicologist would be particularly good at football. Instead, I might take a punt on 17-year-old Dylan Reid, who’s quick, fit, and has potential.
Tactically, I’ve taken some inspiration from our good friend Mr Venables and opted for this 4-3-2-1 (or the ‘Christmas tree’, if you prefer). Obviously, I’d like to have better wing-backs at my disposal, but the quality we have in midfield should help us create plenty of scoring chances while staying fairly solid at the back.
This will be my go-to tactic for most of our home games. In an attempt to make it even more effective, I’ve also asked the groundsman to make our pitch narrower – but not too narrow. I want us to play on a football pitch, not a bowling green.
As a secondary tactic, I’ve gone for something slightly more conventional – a 4-4-2, but with a twist. Because of our left-wing issues, Edwards (or whoever) will instead cut inside from that flank to support the two strikers, while our left-back presses forward.
Mind you, I still have some doubts about whether this is the right system for us. I’ve experimented with different roles for the support striker without much success – perhaps because our frontmen are more comfortable as all-out attackers. I’m open to any tactical ideas, but if early results aren’t good, I might change tack and replace that support striker with a third midfielder.
THE BACKROOM
Apart from Crutches, there were three other staff members at the club when I arrived. Mark Morgans is our Director of Football and will help out with recruitment, while Michael Jones is a highly-disciplined coach. We also have Chelsie-Jane Mason as a fitness coach, though with her negotiating skills, I actually reckon she would make a better DoF than Morgans!
In the weeks after my arrival, I added three new faces to the backroom. Leighanne Kelly filled our physio vacancy after leaving Newport County, while we also hired a new Head of Youth Development and a new chief scout. They’re not terrible, but more importantly, they’re not very expensive.
PRE-SEASON
Barely a week into my tenure, we kicked off pre-season with a frustrating match against Gotye. It took us 70 minutes to get going before Sam Jones kicked off a late four-goal blitz to finally defeat the Australian one-hit wonder. Now he’s just somebody that we used to know.
Hold on… Samuel Johnson’s just pointed out that our opponents were called Goytre (not Gotye) – and that they were from Monmouthshire (not Australia). Also, he says I shouldn’t confuse them with Goytre United, who are from Port Talbot – and who we will play in our first league match!
Anyway, our next two friendlies saw us record comfortable wins at Cwmamman and Bettws (Welsh people must really hate vowels!). Our defence certainly looked sturdy, though our attacks needed some work; our forwards were caught offside 13 times against Bettws!
August ended with my first competitive match, at home to divisional rivals Llanelli Town in Round 1 of the League Cup. This was a close contest, but not a very good one, with both teams displaying the kind of shooting accuracy that would make stormtroopers blush. Eventually, in the 90th minute, Llanelli’s striker cut through our defence to knock us out early.
Despite that, we bounced back at home to a couple of English non-league teams. After battling to a draw with Weston-super-Mare, we produced an even more spirited display against Conference North side Hereford, with Johnson grabbing a late winner after we survived a barrage of attacks.
All in all, that was a decent pre-season which bodes well for the league campaign. However, I am concerned that Captain Morgan and Kyle Jones haven’t yet got up to speed, each posting average ratings of 6.4 over pre-season. If they don’t shape up quickly, I fear that we could be overrun in midfield. (By the way, Crutches, please don’t tell me that we’re being overrun in midfield. It’s not 2017 anymore.)
Another surprise has come up front, where Prosser has so far failed to score. Instead, our goals have mainly been coming from winger Liam Reed and teenage striker Dylan Reid. I hopefully won’t get them mixed up any time soon, but don’t bank on it. I’ve barely understood the fact there are two different villages called Goytre in south Wales!
Before I leave you, these are the board’s expectations for the new season. Our friendly results have me feeling optimistic that we can finish in the top half of the Cymru South, and the media seem to agree. We’ve been tipped to finish 7th out of 16 teams, and have been given odds of 15-2 to win the league.
We enter the Welsh Cup in Round 1, and the board want us to win our first two matches at least. A lot of that depends on the luck of the draw, of course, but the Cymru Premier teams don’t come in until Round 3, which should help.
And that was our introduction to Cambrian & Clydach!
I will be releasing Part 2 of this adventure on Friday. There, we’ll take you through the opening three months of the Cymru South season as Shama faces his first challenges in management.
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Thanks for reading. Now sing us out, Terry!
Fuller FM 
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