Hello and welcome to a new season at the Retirement Home! We’re still on a major high from last week where not only were we promoted from Division 2 but some hero cleared our debt and gave us £2m to spend. That’s a lot of veterans.

Will we spend it wisely in Division 1? I’ll let you be the judge of that…

As much as I’d love to spend the money there aren’t a lot of options. I guess old players with a contract don’t really want to move. Neil Ruddock though will cause the type of chaos we need in our lives.

Stimac could definitely do better than us. He will probably end up captain.

I want to go on the record and say I actually hate Gus Poyet. He scored a lot of goals against Newcastle and then managed Sunderland. He was also sacked on live TV so there’s that. All I’m saying is the incident was based around a human faeces found in the opposition dressing room and he got the sack. Make your own minds up.

Flowers has just been sacked by Wrexham. Their loss is our…well, he’s on the books.

Strunway isn’t great but he’s like a God physically compared to most of our midfield players.

I appreciate I now have a huge surplus of non-EU but it’ll be nice to be able to rotate the squad for once. We are lacking in strikers though and the Micker being out for a month is a big blow.

I’ve earmarked this lad to sign…he looks like he should be incredible but I’m guessing that means he has no hands. At £53k he’s not a risk but we’ll see if he is worthy of starting.

Here’s how we line up to start the season. I had a lot of success playing attacking midfielders as wingbacks last season so hopefully they continue this season.

So it’s going to be like this, is it? Poyet looks the part but Walsall score every shot they have on target. We aren’t really good enough to fight fire with fire.

The League Cup has not been a happy hunting ground for us and we’re going to have to do it the hard way after this loss at Wycombe. Hopefully the away goal proves important.

If this is what it’s going to be like in Division 1 we may as well retire now. Toomas Krom of Estonia causes us problem with two goals and three assists…Dave Watson sees red for hacking him down. Might be a long season, this.

Wycombe are overhauled! Poyet and Drinkell the heroes as we set up a two legged tie with Premier League Southampton.

A rare outing for our black and white away kit sees us win away in front of exactly 10,000 people. Chris Waddle scores a free kick and then pulls his back celebrating. Some people never learn.

Dean Saunders scores against Wrexham which probably means something to the Welsh but our visitors have the last laugh, despite having 10 men.

Darren Huckerby then runs riot against us. Send help.

Wimbledon are managed by Brian Little and he lines up in a direct 4-2-4. Andy Cole is joined by Marcus Gayle and, somewhat bizarrely, Ariel Ortega in a side that is far too good for Division 1. Despite Knill’s best efforts, we lose 2-1. Poyet is out for a month.

Nooooo, why Viv? Why? Our 47 year old veteran departs due to the damn manager clause.

Finally a return to winning ways and it coincides with Quinn’s return from injury. More please.

It’s a struggle against Brentford but we do take a point, though Strunway is the latest to earn a month off.

We can’t score past Bolton though. Awful lot of home games in a row.

The last sees us beaten by Southampton. Dunga departs injured. This is not our battle.

Everton are a Division 1 side despite having Dennis Bergkamp up front. He’s 34 so I’ll be whispering sweet nothings to him about not flying places with us. The much younger Alex Notman seals our latest defeat.

We lead at Vale Park but it soon unravels. Just as we look set to leave with a point we concede from a corner. Massive sigh.

So long, Tim. What might have been.

Ipswich have far too much for us. A recurring theme.

I rotate a lot of the squad for the return leg of Southampton. We’ve got next to no chance so it’s a chance to rest players ahead of a league game we could really do with winning.

Would you believe it, we actually do! Letchkov and the Micker roll back the years to tale us out of the bottom 3.

It’s a very tight table with just 6 points between the bottom 10. A few wins…would be a miracle but it would also catapult us up the table in no time. We’re scoring plenty but keeping them out is a different issue, though we have been better since those opening few games.

Robert Jarni is about to turn 35 and is on a free. It’ll be yet another non-EU but I can’t help but feel he would improve us. Songo’o, Stimac, Poyet and Letchkov are my four non-EU regulars at the moment and it would be difficult to drop any of them. Songo’o averages 7.70 from 17 games so I’d rather not drop him but if Boateng is any good…that could be an option.

Some players turning 35 this season who I’ll be keeping a close eye on – Le Tissier, Batistuta and Brian Laudrup, but whether any of them want to come remains to be seen.

Here’s the squad as it stands today:

See you next week!