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Letou Decide: Swansea City vs. Watford Preview
Later today, we host Watford at the Liberty Stadium. If the Burnley game was a six-pointer and Stuart Reid could only lead Swansea to a point, this is even more significant. It’s 19th vs. 17th and there are just two points between us. A win and we go above Watford for certain, maybe above Burnley […]
Letou Decide: Mlog 12th January
It comes around so quickly, doesn’t it? It only seems like yesterday the members of the press core were here for the Bristol City preview and now they’re back, only this time they’re reporting on league action. As I enter the room I can feel them baying for blood, looking for any sign of weakness […]
CM9798 Tackles FM18 – Part 5: Stay Another Day
Welcome back. It’s not a happy camp here at Notts County, as a promising start has slowly been frittered away by incompetence – mostly mine, but not all. As the calendar turns to November, the dark nights draw in and I remind anyone who will listen that there’s still 6 months of the season to […]
Behind Enemy Lines Episode 17
FM18 Arsenal FC Behind Enemy Lines | Ep 17 |Season Review | Football Manager 2018 Welcome to my channel and welcome to Football Manager 2018 and the current series to the channel Arsenal FC Behind Enemy Lines, me and my team of Ex Tottenham Players take control at the Emirates to get Arsenal back to […]
Letou Decide: Mlog 11th January
Today I wanted to talk tactics with you, but I wanted to do it on the back of a behind closed doors game with our Under 23 side. I know there are issues playing against your own youth team, it’s never a satisfactory experience. If you win by a several, it proves nothing. If you […]
Gunning For Glory: Season Two Recap & Review
2004, the last time Arsenal won the Premier League. 2006, the closest Arsenal have come to winning the Champions League. 2002, the last time Arsenal won a double. Forget all those stats, the times have changed. 2019 is the year of the Gunners! Let’s look back our a fabulous campaign. It is the end of […]
Hopped it to Hamburg Part XXXIV: Moaning.
Catch up on the ISL leg of the journey here For the Hamburg part of the story so far, go here Guten tag. I think that’s how they say it over here. I’m waving at you from Hamburg, mainly because it is the end of my second full season in charge and the end of […]
Letou Decide: Mlog 10th January
There are two periods after you take over at a football club. There’s the initial PLEASE DON’T GET ME SACKED, where you attempt to embed your tactics, get the players onside and keep the board satisfied all while trying to win football matches. Then there’s a period where you start to feel relatively comfortable when […]
Tempo10 E19 – The Attribute Royal Rumble
This week the guys discuss the key part of the game, attributes. Which do they consider to be the more important, technical or mental? What does Matt look for it a Goalkeeper? Which attribute does Mike prefer from a full-back? Will Matt’s dog show up again? (No). These questions all answered during a pod intended […]
Gunning For Glory Season 2 Episode 9: Touching Distance Of A Treble
Our season has been nothing short of sensational. We won the Premier League, with an unstoppable run of nine wins in a row seeing us beat Jose Mourinho’s Manchester United to the title by just a single point. That run is part of a 14 match winning sequence across all competitions that has seen us […]
Behind Enemy Lines Episode 16
FM18 Arsenal FC Behind Enemy Lines | Ep 16 | Last Day Drama | Football Manager 2018 Welcome to my channel and welcome to Football Manager 2018 and the current series to the channel Arsenal FC Behind Enemy Lines, me and my team of Ex Tottenham Players take control at the Emirates to get Arsenal […]
Letou Decide: Mlog 9th January
Last night was good fun with the people from Letou, had a pleasant meal and a valuable chat about what they want for Swansea City, the fan interaction and their support for the Jack Army. What’s more they were there for the FA Cup draw and we watched together, amongst us talk was rife of […]
Gunning For Glory Season 2 Episode 8: Two Semis & A Title Fight
Welcome back to North London, where my Arsenal side have somehow find themselves fighting for a treble. Brighton are our opponents in the FA Cup semi-final and we face a double-header against Manchester City in the Champions League, all while hoping Manchester United slip-up in the Premier League. First up is the semi-final of the […]
CM9798 tackles FM18 – Part 4: Why does it always rain on me?
Welcome back, where I’m trying to learn FM18 as the manager of Notts County. Things were going remarkably well in part 3, it looked like I was going to go a whole update unbeaten, but then we let in 6 at Swindon and my true colours were revealed. Was it a blip? Or is there […]
5 Things to Know About Major League Soccer
Hello, everyone! I’m back with a quick once-off article that’s not about Earning Our Stripes and van Oortveld’s journey with MSV Duisburg. A couple of months ago when Football Manager 2018 was released, I wrote a massive three-part guide covering everything you needed to know about managing an MLS team, and it got a bigger response […]
Letou Decide: Bristol City vs. Swansea City Match Review
The post-match press conference is a blur, a distant memory even just 36 hours later. All I remember are my final words; “I am very pleased with the win, but it is only one match and there is a long way to go.” I stand by every word. A training ground can be a lonely […]
Behind Enemy Lines Episode 15
FM18 Arsenal FC Behind Enemy Lines | Ep 15 | Win Or Bust | Football Manager 2018 Welcome to my channel and welcome to Football Manager 2018 and the current series to the channel Arsenal FC Behind Enemy Lines, me and my team of Ex Tottenham Players take control at the Emirates to get Arsenal […]
The Last Tango in Bucharest: Ep. 8
Back On The European Trail THE MISSION: Enter the unforgiving world of Football Manager 2018, beat your bitter sibling rival to claim prestige in Romania and earn the honour of being named the Last Tango in Bucharest. THE SNAG: The Rivalità Tra Fratelli series on Football Manager 2017 raised more questions than answers in Tango […]
Hopped it to Hamburg Part XXXIII: Learnings from Big Sam and Pulisball
Catch up on the ISL leg of the journey here For the Hamburg part of the story so far, go here Feliz Reyes folks. Three Kings Day here in Spain which is, believe it or not, bigger than Christmas Day meaning in true Spanish style they’ve managed to lengthen the fiestas by at least another […]
The ICT Crowd #5: Maybe promotion wasn’t such a great idea…
I’ve gotten teams promoted before on Football Manager. FM08: I cantered to the Championship title with recently relegated Spurs. FM14: I cantered to both the League One and Championship titles with Rangers. FM15: Got Rangers promoted as champions. The following seasons though were fairly straightforward for the most part. With Spurs, I’d sold off the […]
Letou Decide: Bristol City vs. Swansea City Preview
Right, time to concentrate. The whirlwind of meeting players, various board members coming below stairs to offer their support and the jackals of the press core, they’ve come to an end for the moment. As I pen this for you, I’m just waiting for the squad to come down for breakfast in the hotel we’ve […]
The Liechtenstein Test: Can a minnow win the World Cup?
Webster’s Dictionary defines an experiment as… “an operation or procedure carried out under controlled conditions in order to discover an unknown effect or law, to test or establish a hypothesis, or to illustrate a known law” Having received a new bunsen burner for Christmas, I’m back in the lab with another experiment this week. Taking […]
Letou Decide: Mlog 5th January
Before going into the press conference, there’s the small matter of switching vice-captain to Alfie Mawson to be done. Ángel Rangel has served the club with distinction but realistically he is now a distant second choice behind Kyle Naughton at right (wing) back. We need some English grit and fighting spirit, God knows we need […]
CM9798 tackles FM18 – Part 3: The Sho must go on
Here in the county of Nottinghamshire, it’s not all Robin Hood this and…Trent Bridge that. No no, football has its place on the map and yes, our neighbours have the more illustrious history, but one day, we might emulate their European Cup win. In the meantime though, we have a friendly. Away to Didcot. I’m […]
#Tempo10 Episode 18: New Years Resolution
Mike is back in the hotseat this week after getting jealous of Matt’s time as the big man on the podcast. This guys talk about some different goals and aims to keep your save fresh, or give you some motivation to push on with that save you’ve been putting off. Perhaps you fancy signing players […]
Letou Decide: Charlie Tango Arrives
I was happy in Romania. I was successful in Romania. Dinamo Bucharest were top of the league, progress being made in Europe… but I couldn’t say no. Not to the Premier League. As a player I never played a full game in the Premier League, only managing a few substitute appearances with Sam Allardyce’s Bolton […]
Gunning For Glory Season 2 Episode 7: Pushing Through Crucial Tests
I’m really not sure how I feel about our league campaign. Like last year, we never expected to be challenging for the title just yet but we found ourselves with a chance. However, once again, we’ve dipped away and defeat in the North London derby has seemingly ended any lingering hopes of success. We’re not […]
Gunning For Glory Season 2 Episode 6: Cup Magic Is Our Specialty
Welcome back to the North London fire sale, where the latest news is that Olivier Giroud, Mohamed Elneny and Santi Cazorla are set to leave. The former is rejoining Theo Walcott at Lyon and Elneny is off to China, whilst Cazorla is set for a stint to Espanyol. I thought I had Perez off my […]
Hopped it to Hamburg Part XXXII: How I set-up my training
Catch up on the ISL leg of the journey here For the Hamburg part of the story so far, go here In this bumper day of content I’ve talked you through how we got promoted at Hamburg and how I recruited the squad. Now we are going to look at how I set-up my training. […]
Hopped it to Hamburg Part XXXI: How I recruited my promotion winning squad
Catch up on the ISL leg of the journey here For the Hamburg part of the story so far, go here So if you read the piece published earlier today, you’ll be aware that we got promotion at the first time of asking by finishing second to Stuttgart. What made this quite special was that […]
Hopped it to Hamburg Part XXX: Can I do it on a cold night in Frankfurt?
Catch up on the ISL leg of the journey here For the Hamburg part of the story so far, go here It’s been a while since I’ve written an almost whole season roundup, so here we go. I’ll break it into the following parts. How we did (as in, do I still have a job?) […]
Gunning For Glory Season 2 Episode 5: Flying High As We Enter January
If you thought I’d moved on from that drubbing of Bayern Munich, you are wrong. I plan to bring it up as much as possible. We’re through as group winners, with our opponents in the Round of 16 to be confirmed, and top the Premier League. It’s worth mentioning that we were unstoppable in December […]
Behind Enemy Lines Episode 14
FM18 Arsenal FC Behind Enemy Lines | Ep 14 | No Shots Lads | Football Manager 2018 Welcome to my channel and welcome to Football Manager 2018 and the current series to the channel Arsenal FC Behind Enemy Lines, me and my team of Ex Tottenham Players take control at the Emirates to get Arsenal […]
CM9798 tackles FM18 – Part 2: Masterplan
Welcome back to Meadow Lane, as we once again we try to find out if a man who has spent most of the last 10 years playing exclusively retro Championship Manager can be a success on FM18. League Two will not know what has hit it. In Part 1, I set up a coaching structure […]
Letou Decide: Southampton vs Swansea
A poor result for Swansea heaps a huge amount of pressure on manager Stuart Reid as his Swansea team slump to 18th in the table. The next game against Burnley is massive… The Match Southampton looked full of attacking swagger from the off and got an early goal as Romeu headed home after just 16 minutes. […]
Letou Decide: Swansea vs Burnley Match Preview
This is the very definition of a 6 pointer as struggling Swansea face fellow strugglers Burnley. Both teams have been in poor form of late and there’s rumours that this could be Reid’s last game in charge if he fails to get a win… Lineups Swansea: Burnley: Join us over at the HigherTempo Twitter for […]
The Last Tango in Bucharest: Ep. 7
Rivalry Intensifies THE MISSION: Enter the unforgiving world of Football Manager 2018, beat your bitter sibling rival to claim prestige in Romania and earn the honour of being named the Last Tango in Bucharest. THE SNAG: The Rivalità Tra Fratelli series on Football Manager 2017 raised more questions than answers in Tango Towers. Is Charlie […]
Letou Decide: Southampton vs Swansea Match Preview
Both teams are in a rotten run of form which doesn’t fill me with hope in terms of excitement, but here’s how the teams will line up. Southampton: Swansea: Join us for all the action over at TheHigherTempo Twitter account for all the action live at 3 PM!
Letou Decide: Mlog 29th December
As is routine the day before a match, it’s my favourite time of the week – press conference time! Reporter: Man Utd manager Jose Mourinho has taken perhaps the bold step of placing Marcos Rojo on the transfer list. Is that a decision you agree with and indeed, if put the same position, would you have […]
CM9798 tackles FM18: Part 1 – Like riding a bike (whilst eating an apple)
Greetings. The festive period is a time for traditions. Carols are sung, presents are exchanged and footballers are forced to play more than once a week. A lesser known tradition is that I try and play the latest version of Football Manager, after spending the previous 51 weeks of the year stuck in a retro […]
Behind Enemy Lines Episode 13
FM18 Arsenal FC Behind Enemy Lines | Ep 13 | Do or Die | Football Manager 2018 Welcome to my channel and welcome to Football Manager 2018 and the current series to the channel Arsenal FC Behind Enemy Lines, me and my team of ex-Tottenham Players take control at the Emirates to get Arsenal back […]
FM18 Formation Guide: 2-4-3-1
Unorthodox at Best The reason people love Football Manager so much is that you can do whatever you want. You want to take Shrewsbury to the Champions League, you can. You want to develop great youth products, you can. You want to break goalscoring records using the top teams, you can. This formation is one […]
Hopped it to Hamburg: A new beginning (Part XXIX)
Catch up on any parts you have missed right here! The title gives it away. Having resigned from Mumbai City after five back-to-back ISL titles I was offered interviews by PSV, Ajax, Feyenoord and Hamburg. I won’t lie, I would have preferred any of the Dutch jobs but they went elsewhere – but Hamburg heard […]
The Land of Opportunity VI
The United States Men’s National Team has made it into the World Cup, but how far can we go? I wanted to push for advancing beyond the group stage in this run, since getting past the group stage has been the average final position for the USMNT in recent World Cups. Want to know how […]
Letou Decide: Mlog 28th December
It’s time to talk tactics for the Southampton game. 3-5-2 has been a bit hit and miss for us but I’m leaning towards keeping it for this match. If the analyst is correct and Southampton line up like this then it should hopefully play into our hands. The big advantage of the 3-5-2 is obviously […]
Gunning For Glory Season 2 Episode 4: Road To Recovery
We’re still in the title race but christ, that defeat to Manchester United was bleak. We were absolutely awful and Kolasinac is really rattling me up at the moment, I have no idea why he’s trying to kill everyone. If PSG come in for him again, I’ll carry him there myself. There’s two weeks to […]
Letou Decide: Mlog 27th December 2017
Well, that was a disappointing festive period with 2 losses from 2 very winnable games with an astonishing lack of discipline within the team that contributed to 3 penalties over those 2 games (proving to be the deciding goals in each game). I don’t instruct my players to tackle hard so I’m going to chalk […]
The Madness of Mumbai Part XXVIII: A change of destination?
Catch up on any parts you have missed right here! Season’s greetings to you all. Welcome back to India where we actually have some news for once. I’ll cut to the punchline immediately, following the end of the 2023/24 season I left Mumbai City FC. Why? We’ll get to that. Did I leave on a […]
Tempo10 Ep17: Christmas Special
Matt and Mike join you this week for a Christmas and new year special. They chat about some of their favourite Football Manager moments across years gone by, and for them, a lot have. This is something all players of the game will relate to.
Gunning For Glory Season 2 Episode 3: The Big Tests Drop Quickly
It’s been a big week away from Football Manager and, amidst it all, I’m preparing for a new challenge. I don’t want this save to end but I’m keen on what I’ve got planned. Is it possible to run two saves together? I’m not sure. Let me know what you want to see, my Twitter […]