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Three and Easy

Written by Matt-

This evening hattrick plays host to the England Cup Final. Could Matt- take Vince Hilaire and his Afros to a Premiership & Cup double? In his 3rd ht-interview, Matt- answers a few of our questions, but his opponent, Rockphil, may still need help figuring out whether matt- used a TI trick to PIN on Sunday, or whether Matt- really intends to roll over on a PIC in the cup final in order to boost TS ahead of his push to win the Prem?

Congratulations on making the cup final, and most importantly on being the first manager to be interviewed for the third time. (18330) (17411). Your opposition, Rockhill Rangers look good for 500+ hatstats, but after pulling a utopian midfield on Sunday to beat h00ligans to go top of the Prem (523043133) (combined hatstats totalling 1,084), your opponent Rockphil must be wondering if you've thrown everything at that game and left the cup final in the lap of the fat tails of random?

So, you noticed that I PIC in that match then right?

"Rockhill is clearly a massive favorite and I’m just hoping not to take a confidence battering."

The league is fairly obviously my priority so I will apologise now to anyone who was hoping to watch a competitive cup final!

[Ed. the roflcopter blades go round and round]

Last time we asked you Is everything still on track for the Afros to become the number 1 team in England? Your answer was understated:- "I suppose a lot of it comes down to luck in the top league (with the teams being so similar) so the aim is just to take part if we can."

You can't understate the situation now, as you are currently top of the Prem. When we first interviewed you 18-19 months ago, the foundations were in place with players aged 21-26. The question is surely not so much whether you will win it this season, but how many Prem titles can you win with your current team?

I would have to agree that I’m the No.1 team in the country. HTEV has ranked me as number 1 for the last 13 weeks. However, this doesn’t mean that I will win the league as it is very close between the top 4-6 teams and it comes down to a series of coin tosses. My team could be play for another 4 seasons without requiring a single transfer so that’s good news. Beyond that it very much depends upon how much money I make. I’m looking at a £5m+ profit this season, whatever happens with the last few games. I would guess a lot of that is because I had very low fan expectations!

You know that I’m a bit of a geek with statistics. I’d love to win the league just once, which would be more than enough. Having said that, it is worth noting that only 6 teams have won the league 3+ times, so if we’re talking fantasy-land that's where I'd like to end up. Realistically, however, I think that England has 6-7 top teams at the moment, so some very good teams will probably end up winning nothing. Hopefully I won’t be one of them. I’d also love to play Anders (61704) or Vendetta (63129) in the Premier League, so it would be nice if they could get a move on and get promoted before I hit a decline!

Everyone can see the best teams in the top couple of leagues but I feel I should make an outside prediction and pick one to watch from IV. Having beaten Imaginary Madrid (954794) in the cup this season (526515351) (Ed. but see previous round (526387502) for clues supporting this prediction) I think that they’ll win the Cup or Premier League in the next 5-6 seasons (if not sooner).

You made the last 16 of the masters when you last won the cup, tells us about that particular journey?

It was pretty much a money making exercise and not much beyond that. It was the only tournament that I’ve entered in recent times where I felt that I had no chance of winning. Whilst normal teams can compete a lot more now, you still have to contend with massive traders who can support wages at much higher levels than a normal team.

If we’re talking about my second team, then it’s a different matter. I think I could have a chance of winning it with that side (a long time in the future). If you can dominate in a smaller nation and run a good YA you can challenge anyone. With the competition so tight here in England, you actually need a lot of fortune to win the masters (see Malk) or trade or hoard heavily (see Hackers).

You've had some fairly controversial moments on the forums over the years. Animal behavioural experts claim that this sort of behaviour is typical of a strong young lion emerging within the pride, challenging Scarface for his dominant position. You then went off and laid scent marks all over the international community after your stint as the England U20 coach, making a mark in the NT/U20s for Jordan, South Africa, Sweden and Brazil (albeit only in Jordan as NT coach). Are you just about ready now to return home and make your challenge to take over your English pride of lions, and put all your experience to good use?

I’d love to manage the England NT side. I’ve never stood in that election mainly for the reasons that you’ve pointed out above! I don’t think I could win an election in England anymore. I do still think that the NT is complete shambles (I think Ash is a really nice guy but off the pitch we’re still a million miles from being optimal and it’s worse than when he took over in my very humble opinion) so hopefully one day someone will sort it out, but it is unlikely to be me. I don’t think that I’m the best club manager in England and I’m some distance off that mark if I’m brutally honest (maybe Posti (7991) or Derim (56027) for me). However, I do think that I’m probably the best NT/U20 manager that we have and we haven’t won a medal since I jacked it in.

Everyone loves a bit of modesty, right?

I think I could win a medal with England but it would take a number of campaigns and the electorate don’t seem to give the managers more than a term to sort it out (see Malk and Darth losing 2nd term elections). Net result is that you spend the first term sorting out someone else’s mess and then you’re booted out before you can benefit from the changes that you’ve started to make. It’s not really selling itself is it? Saying all that I’m sure I could still be tempted to run as it’s probably the only NT job that I could be motivated to do now.

What you've achieved in the game already takes considerable patience, and commitment to a long term strategy. You must have known that those youngsters you'd put together were good enough to take you all the way. Please tell us what wage caps you think people should be self-policing in Div V through IV, III, II and the Prem (currently you are at £405k per week) and the skill levels vs age of your players you would advise managers looking to emulate you to get in place to do this?

When I re-built the aim was to reach the Premier League and win something (either the league or cup). So having achieved that, anything else is a bonus. But yes, I knew the plan I had would get me to the top league, I wouldn’t have done such a long re-build if I wasn’t confident of that.

With regards to the wages it’s a fairly difficult question to answer as with most things in Hattrick it depends (how multi skilled are you, how far can you go in the cup, etc). I thought that I could get to the Premier League on less than £300k a week. On the way back up I tried to keep my wages as low as possible. I won my V with £118k and £122k wages. I then won my IV with £152k wages. In III I came second with £212k wages and then won it the following season with £278k wages. In the season with the lower wages I made a £1.5m profit and in the season with the higher wages I made a £3.7m profit (as I won the cup) so if you’re successful you can always push higher. When winning the cup I realised that I couldn’t compete with the teams in the top divisions in a midfield fight (I needs a couple of ringers) so I raised my wages to £361k in II and won the league in my first attempt. My wages this season are actually averaging £371k per week (mainly due to wage rebates for my 3 NT players). I’m carrying an extra winger but could do with an extra inner.

I saw in the US that the top teams shared their player’s skills with the community. This actually helped me to set some targets as I could see what could be achieved with certain skill sets. I’d happily share my skills in HT England if the rest of the Premier League teams did the same. The most important thing with a long term plan is to be adaptable. When I realised that my inners were coming up short I sold my ex England U20 internationals and brought some inners with 2-3 more levels of PM. If you make a 10 season+ plan that you can’t change at all then it’s not going to be successful.

6. In your last interview, back in October 14 you claimed to be on 20% stamina. How has this changed, and why?

You seem sceptical that I was on 20%?! I was. At the moment I’m on 27.5% but I have mostly been using around 30-32% this season. I like to have all my players on excellent stamina. Ideally, they should be higher than on low-excellent as they currently are, so I will probably go a bit higher next season. Maybe 35%? I'm not training much & it doesn't make sense for my players to lose ratings during the game.

Please tell us your thoughts on the recent price hikes, and whether you will be maintaining your platinum 2nd team?

They’ve gone too far with the latest hike, its way beyond reasonable. I think they've got it completely wrong. I extended before the hike so hopefully it will come down before my supporter runs out. Didn’t I suggest second teams directly to Zattikka? If so, I’ll have to take some of the blame for the current prices!

I really like my second team and would like to continue it in the future but I don’t think I would pay the current prices as they’re a million miles away from what they should be. If my team is looking like doing what I want it to do then I may be tempted to extend but I suppose that’s exactly what they want me to do.

What song is going to be played as your team run onto the pitch for the cup final?

Glad all over I guess! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-hL7ryCy3Y) Even though I imagine I’ll be feeling a long way from glad whilst this match is taking place.

For anyone that doesn’t know that’s the Palace national anthem.

Your manager page states that you support Crystal Palace. Newcastle fans thought that Pardew was a shower of excrement, and wanted him sacked, but since he left Palace have improved, whilst the Geordies very nearly got themselves demoted, and are only arguably still in the Prem as a result of the points won under Pardew. What do you make of it all, and who have been your top 3 players of the season?

I really like Pardew, he’s a bit of a legend in a small corner of South London. It’s great to finally have a manager who wants to be here (after Pulis who clearly didn’t) hopefully he can build something special. I think this season was only the third time in our history that we finished in the top 10. I’d love us to win a cup (any cup!), that would be a dream. Past the Zenith Data Shield we have the proud achievement of zero major trophies in a 110 year history. Top 3 players is fairly easy; Bolasie, Bolasie and Bolasie. The guy is a genius. I’d also mention Scott Dann and Jason Puncheon who should be in the England squad IMO. I have no idea how some of the players (particularly Townsend) get in ahead of those two (I’m starting to doubt if Roy really is a Palace fan). Hopefully we can keep that lot and sign some of the fantasy players that we’re being linked with (Remy, Cabaye, Demba Ba – spot the connection?).

Please tell us how you think the recent changes planned to fix the over-reliance on TDF and side attacks will be implemented, and what sorts of players are going to be the winners and losers in the transfer market once the changes are announced?

I’ve never been reliant on TDF’s myself, I’m not even sure if I’ve ever even owned one (I don’t think I have from memory). I prefer QDF’s and have three. Scoring is a secondary skill for two of these players and a primary for the other (2 of the 3 are internationals) so any boost to middle attack would be more than welcome as far as I’m concerned.