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Major League for Scottish Manager

Written by JPtheBean

Here's a success story of a Scot abroad, originally published in HT-Press USA by editor RobertZiegler (639238):

One of the newcomers to Major League this season is a Scots expat who celebrated his latest HT promotion by getting married. Well, it's not really a cause and effect relationship - but he DID just get married. Learn more about the quick rise to the top series of USA by Omega5 (567816) and Rangers F.C. (223560)

I didn’t ask HT player Omega5 what the biggest event of his recent life has been. After all, the 10-year veteran of Hattrick recently won promotion for his Rangers F.C. team to the top division of USA in the game.

So that has to be it, right? As it turns out, our man had a competing interest for that honor as he was married just before Christmas.

Since he graciously agreed to an interview just after returning to his Twin Cities home from his honeymoon, I decided against putting him on the spot (just in case his new bride happens to read this).One of two newcomers this season to Major League, Anthony (real name) has followed a careful plan of earning much, saving carefully and spending well.

Anthony and his Rangers F.C. team were in Division VI just 18 real-life months ago. Having accumulated a nice nest egg after a period of training and saving money, Anthony began making some purchases in Season 48, starting the building phase a week late by his own admission. Rangers fell just short of promotion that season, but the process had begun and there was, literally, no turning back.

The team won promotion in each of the next five seasons, going from DVI to DI in seasons 49 to 53. In those five seasons, Rangers earned 201 out of 210 possible points, with 8 points being the closest margin of victory in the league table. His total purchases during that time amounted to approximately 60 million U.S. dollars.

In building the team that rose five levels in five seasons, Anthony admitted to a few hiccups along the way as he had failed to track with some of the changes in the game while he had been saving; but clearly he made the right adjustments and in a timely fashion, given his dominance at each level.

“Well, to be honest, I actually lost interest in the game for a while, but I always knew I'd be back, so I didn't want to abandon my team. I was really busy travelling and doing a lot of whitewater kayaking all over. As such, my time and access was limited. So I just trained, and built up some funds,” he explained. “Once I moved to the Twin Cities area and away from the rivers I had been playing and working on, I was able to renew my interest in the game and started to use those funds to rebuild. I also made the mistake of buying players without doing a little research as to how the game had changed while I was away. So I had completely missed the new (at the time) emphasis on multi-skilled players and bought a lot of single high-skilled players.

“As I learned some of the finer points of the new engine changes, I swapped out some players and the players I added were more multi-skilled than the previous ones. My goal was to promote as fast as possible as I lost a lot of money those first promotions from VI to V and V to IV.

"Once I got to III, I was almost breaking even, so I was able to bring in a few more players, however at that point I was at a level with managers who were smarter than I and were able to game plan better than I. So I did a few things. One: I started to buy players with specialties (mostly Head) to try and get some extra goals not attributed to possession, and I posed a lot of questions to a friend I had made way back in the beginning of a federation I was in. That accompanied with HAM and Foxtrick allowed me to adapt and prepare much better for matches by optimizing lineups and having easier access to see opponent tendencies. I also switched all my non GK training weeks to SP as that gave me more goals and allowed me to keep more out as well.”

While he dropped the opening match of this season’s Major League schedule by a 2-1 score to fellow newcomers Baltiburg (who also have risen from the depths in short order), Anthony is optimistic about his chances this season, while recognizing the challenge will be stiff.

“It's going to be tough, no doubt about it,” he said.
“There are some really good managers in I and they have been up at the top for a long time, so they have the experience to go with it. I think it will be extremely hard to finish at the top, but then again I was 100% positive that I would not win my II at the beginning of last season and I finished with no losses and only one draw, so you can plan and do the math, but sometimes it comes down to a coin flip and some dumb luck, and with that I feel I have as good a shot as anyone!”

As you might guess from his team name, Anthony was born in Scotland (he is originally from Dunoon, to the west of Glasgow), and is an avid supporter of the Glasgow-based club after which his team is named (Full disclosure – the author of this article is also a rabid Rangers supporter and has been over several times to his ancestral home to watch matches).

Anthony became a U.S. citizen in 1999 and enjoys whitewater kayaking, collecting movies and even the NFL, making him a veritable Yankee Doodle Dandy.

While the real-life Rangers club has had to deal with adversity of late, being relegated to the fourth tier of Scots football due to financial issues (and well on its way to two promotions in two seasons), Anthony and a number of family members maintain their allegiance and loyalty.

“The last few years have been tough going for sure,” he told us. “It's really hard to keep up with the team, A) being in America and B) having to start over from the bottom division. But you don't abandon your team when they are down, so I see it as a badge of pride that I still support the team even through these tough times. Plus it will be that much sweeter once we are back to the top!”

Couldn’t have said it better myself.

As to his recent wedding, a Scots theme including bagpipers and kilts was featured, along with Irish aspects in honor of his new wife’s background (and for the ill-informed American reader, Scots and Irish are NOT the same thing).

Anthony is confident married life and HT can coexist peacefully in his household.

“She is aware of Hattrick and is already very much used to me watching games on Sunday and Wednesday. She doesn't quite understand why 10 years later I still play the game, but she really doesn't mind. I guess she figures I could be interested in things far worse than HT!”

So there in one article you have successful formulas for both Hattrick success and domestic tranquility. We are a full service HT press service here in the U.S.

-- Article originally published in HT-Press USA by editor RobertZiegler (639238)