Community » Hattrick Press

Cup Final Ville Interview

Written by ville_man

So it is Cup final week. The two biggest achieving managers (according the achievement stats on the England front page) are going head to head, and as I write this they are locking horns in a crucial Prem fixture (as a warm up).

We interviewed Broughy last week, and this week we put Ville in the hot seat.

1 Your team, Ville Warriors, is facing Stinging Scorpions in the cup final on Tuesday, just two days after you faced them at home in the Prem on Sunday. Going into Sundays game you were 2pts ahead of them, in 2nd spot, with Broughy 3rd, and just 3 matches to play to decide the title. It doesn't get any better than this as a hattrick manager, does it? How do you even prepare for a week like this? Presumably either of you could sacrifice the cup to get ahead in the league, or both of you could lose the league by throwing it all at the cup final? Would you consider a double mutual PIC, have either of you discussed or proposed this, and if not, why not?

It really is a crazy and exciting week, facing the same team in the league and cup final makes it extra special as a league win will be give a crucial team confidence advantage for the Cup Final. With a Prem title still possible for both our teams in the league, a double PIC agreement would make complete sense. That said, it's a no brainer that we would both PIC in the league so I think that really only makes a PIC agreement for the cup final a serious option. In all honesty I don't think anyone could trust another manager enough to agree to a PIC deal in the final of cup! Such a deal could easily lead to pretty untasteful accusations from the losing manager, so there are no deals being done, and there has been no discussion to do so other than some banter between us on possibilities to PIC. I really do not think it would make any sense to consider any PIC agreement for such a big game.

2 You took over your team on 05/08/03 and have pretty much done it all. You've managed the England NT twice, as well as the England U20 team. You've won the Prem title 3 times, and won the Cup for the first time a couple of seasons ago. OK, so you've not won the masters and Broughy is the only manager in England with more achievement points, but seriously, what keeps you interested in the game? I ask this bearing in mind how many managers have lost interest having won Premierships and Cup finals, and in Bud's case after he won the Masters. You've taken plenty of stick along the way (on the England forum and NT forums) as well, so have you ever considered jacking it all in and taking up golf or something?

Ha! I already play golf :) I would love to win the masters, but not sure the team would have the funds to do so, I may well go for it in the masters if I get to play in it again with a decent enough team.

I have actually thought about packing it all in several times. My life has been pretty turbulent (to say the least) over the last 5 years. Things have calmed down recently, but it leaves me with too many HT regrets over this time, mostly fuelled from being in my 'bad place' and not really having any way to vent, and consequently I ended up being way too prickly within this community. The ambition I really have is to manage the NT again but I just can't man up enough to press the button to apply yet!

3 How much is a pint of beer in your local & what's your usual tipple?

£3.20 for a pint, my tipple is Peroni (http://files.the-group.net/library/sabmiller/client_upload/Image/News_article_images/2012/Peroni240512.jpg)

4 This season, the England community voted in Darth Hansen to be our National Team manager. He's the first ever non-English based manager to get the job. Under his tenure England are currently 2nd in Group 5, 2pt behind Italy with a 2pt cushion and a big GD advantage over Croatia (the best of the teams outside the Q2 qualification places). As an ex-England NT manager, did you vote, do you still follow the NT, and what do you make of this season's developments?

Yep, I always vote, I have a real love affair with the NT and follow it every Friday and I'm a big Darth Fan. Anyone who has a star wars prefix on their user-name is bound to be good! If all else fails they can just use the force :)
I think the NT is in a good place at the moment and long may that continue.

5 What skill are you training at the moment and why?

The team trains playmaking just to keep the middies PM up as long as possible, and add some PM to other m/f contributing players whenever possible.

6 You currently have platinum supporter, with a second team in Division VI here in England. Your series (7326) contains five bots, and a couple of active locals. Is platinum something you will continue to fund at the revised prices, and is your 2nd team going to be as successful as Ville Warriors?

The cost of it is not such a bother for me so platinum will stay in place until I either get bored and pack it all in, or just decide that one team is enough. I have opted to make my second team English, purely as it creates English youth players, and thus hopefully benefits our NT in the longer term. I do not think my second team could ever be as successful but I would like to think it could have some level of success, they should win their series this season so that's at least something, albeit a very small achievement.

7 According to our internet research, a Ville is a town in French. Not a French town. You've never changed team name in all these years, even if your pro-Everton logo has long since been replaced. Please tell us how you decided upon the name, and what it means to you now, after all these years?

The name was a snap reaction thing, I had to put a team name in and I used to live in a town called Waterlooville so I just went for Ville. I did nearly change it about a year ago as fancied something fresh but I could not bring myself to lose the name, who knows, maybe it will get changed one day?

8 Please tell us how you met your OH (or last 'conquest' if single), with any amusing anecdotals?

We met at work, depending on who you ask you will get two versions of events, one version is that she sent me a message via social media asking me out 'for a drink'... The other version is that I asked her out for dinner.
Either way, the rest is history.

9 What was your favourite movie of 2013?

Olympus has Fallen (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2302755/) or Cpt Phillips (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1535109/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1) were both superb, but Olympus has Fallen shades it for me.

10 You have been a bit of a Marmite manager, with plenty of support helping you win several election popularity contests, but conversely, you've been openly, fiercely criticized by large numbers of well respected long standing managers a few of whom went so far as to campaign to blackball you for screwing the NT for your own team's benefit. Old wounds now, any fresh pickings at the scabs?

It's fair comment to describe me as a Marmite manager. I really have not done myself any favours at all. I always had such a strong opinion and sometimes just did not listen and I have over-reacted sometimes too.

I think I have been on a HT roller coaster at times, but I feel like I've finally gotten off that particular ride, and I now feel much more settled in myself. I try to maintain a much more positive outlook and I think this is really due to my now being in a better place (finally) in the real world. Hopefully that will continue, and things will just get better and better from here.