Good day to you! We have a bonus Champ Man & Me for you, as every now and again things move quickly in the Twittersphere (it’s a thing…) and I get excited and have to talk about it. This week, I’m joined by Mark Simpson – Media Manager for Hartlepool United.

If you aren’t on Twitter, you’re probably confused. Allow me to eleborate. Mark runs Hartlepool’s official Twitter account and recently has been using a bit of a theme to share news from Victoria Park…

Anybody who uses CM graphics in the real world is a winner in my book, and so I got in touch with Mark to get the story behind it all. You’ll find some examples of said tweets within the interview below

Thanks for joining us, Mark. You’ve been using the Championship Manager graphics on the Hartlepool Twitter account recently, what gave you the idea to to do that?

I was actually speaking to a journalist I know about the Subbuteo-style graphics that we’ve been using for our previews on social media and our Official Website – they’ve also proved pretty popular. He said to me “next season you should do something around retro Champ Manager!” and I just thought “why wait until next season?!” Haha. I loved the 97/98 version so got to work on putting together some graphics and it’s gone from there.

Do you make them all yourself? Is it time consuming or is it a case of building a template and going from there?

Yes, I have made them myself. I am not particularly a graphic designer but it was a bit of a labour of love to try and make them all as accurate as I could. They have probably taken a couple of hours each to set up a template I was happy with but obviously now they’re done they only take a little tweaking for each game. It is quite basic design in essence but the time has been increased just to try and get every detail included as it was in the game. We also edit the full-time screen during the game so that it’s ready to go at the final whistle – I think that’s one that will definitely go down better with three points in the bag!

How have they been received by the club and the fans? Obviously I absolutely love it!

Haha, thank you! I love them too. The goal gif we did which mimicked what happened when a team scored in Champ Man has gone down the best. That got plenty of attention on Twitter both on the night we debuted it (when we scored our equaliser against Chester) and then in the days following it. It’s still getting retweeted and favourited now almost a week on. It’s obviously hit a button with a lot of people and we’re pleased with how it’s been received. It’s just about trying to do something different on social media these days so we’re happy with the reaction to the CM graphics. It even got a mention on BBC last Wednesday!

Will they be a feature all season or is it just temporary?

The idea would be to keep them going all season but we’ll judge it as we go along. We will probably limit them to around matchday but if they remain popular we might throw a couple of new ones in here and there throughout the week as the campaign progresses. The squad list page which we used to accompany our team news story was well-received too. I think we’ll know if and when people grow tired of them but hopefully it’s not for a while and we see the goal gif being used lots and lots for the rest of the season!

Is CM9798 your favourite version of the game?

Yes, definitely. Every year I try my best to get in to the most recent incarnation of the game but I last about a day and I am back on 97/98. I just find the current ones too intricate and time-consuming – I like the simplicity of the 97/98 version. I do love some of the new things they put in to games these days but I haven’t got the patience to wade through it all and never get past the first season before I am back trying to sign Bjorn Heidenstrom and Andrew Duncan.

Everybody has one save that takes over their lives – what’s yours?

Haha! I have actually got quite in to a particular type of challenge in the game where I edit my hometown team (Peterlee) in to Division Three in place of a non-league side so that they start the summer with no players. You’ve then got a race against time to build a squad to start the season with a strong hand! I even got the Kit Man at Hartlepool doing the same thing on the coach to away games – much to the amusement of everyone else on board! I have taken quite a few Peterlee teams to the Premier League title in the past but I have just started a new one, inspired by all the Champ Man talk of recent weeks!

Unfortunately Hartlepool dropped out of the Football League last year, are you confident of a swift return despite a rocky start?

Yes, I think we have to remain confident. We have had a rocky start and nobody is hiding from that but there are only five games gone at the moment so there’s no need to panic. Once we get that first win under our belts I am pretty sure we’ve got a strong enough squad to move right up the league so hopefully that can come sooner rather than later because it has been a frustrating first fortnight.

Do you ever get the chance to play the modern FM games? Hartlepool on FM18 could be a good save…

As I say, I have played them in the past but I never really get drawn in to them as much as 97/98 – I always end up back on that whenever I spent any time on a new version of the game. Maybe I will give FM18 another go though and let you know how I get on with Hartlepool!

You’re the Media Manager at Hartlepool, can you talk us through a typical match day for you?

Well, most matchdays I do the online commentary for our Official Website which goes out to fans all around the world so that’s my favourite part of the day. Before that it’s all about making sure all visiting press are catered for and also updating our various social media platforms with content in the run-up to kick-off. We’ll release the team news online an hour before kick-off and then head to the press box. After the game I will interview the Manager and some players and then spend my evening uploading that video content on to the website and then begin on editing highlights of the game. It’s a busy day but enjoyable most of the time – particularly when we win!!

Do you have any advice for anybody looking to break into that line of work? It must be pretty cool to work for a football club?!

It is pretty cool to work for a football club though everything you do is dictated to a large extent by how the team is performing. I can’t lie though – if someone had said to me when I was at school that I could go in to a job where I spend most of my days talking or writing about football then I would have been pretty happy! I would say my best advice to people looking to do a similar kind of job to me would be to try and get some experience whilst you’re still studying. There obviously aren’t too many jobs in the industry so if you can back up your academic qualifications with some voluntary experience it can help get you the break you need.

Thanks again to Mark for taking the time out to answer my questions – you can follow Mark on Twitter @MarkSimpsonHUFC

You’ll also find Hartlepool and hopefully more CM goodness on Twitter @HUFC