We begin season two/end season one of our five season challenge by making a couple of key signings.  Croatian legend Slaven Bilic joins on a free, I think because Everton were relegated and Azerbaijani international Demis Ohandjanian signs from Macclesfield, the club I replaced in Division three.  I make another couple of signings, Andy Tennant for £190k, I think he is Maurice Malpas’s regen and aging Belarussian AMC Sergei Gerasimets for free.  I try to sign the Icelandic regen but he’s not interested.

As has become tradition, well, for the second year running, the blog squad bought each other random football shirts for Secret Santa.  I was lucky enough to receive this beauty from King of the Rook (Andrew Chapman), a Gateshead keepers jersey. 

Along with the gift, I now needed to create a blog.  Gateshead are non-league on CM9798, so I moved them into Division 3 to replace Macclesfield (I think) and begin my five-season adventure.  The rules and challenge are simple enough:

Challenge:

• How far can you get in five seasons, starting with a team full of grey players?

Rules:

• PSR, I can only spend 75% of the money I make through player sales and prize money.  I’ve made a handy little spreadsheet to ensure compliance.
• No using the loan trick to mitigate the big club release clause.