.

Another sleepless night, but this time it wasn't caused by the pain of an injury or worrying that I'd made a fool of myself. This was pure excitement. Emma sensed that I was hyper and did her best to take my mind off things. That helped. For a few hours.

While she slept, I crept down to the crabapple and made some notes. I had so many thoughts, tumbling and spinning, colliding, blocking each other. I needed to organise them. See if they meant anything.

The first note simply read: EVANS OUT

MD was unhappy. For the first time, he was thinking about sacking Ian Evans. Without me, he would have thought Evans was doing a good job in hard times. My ability to 'see' the future left Evans no wriggle room. I was sure that if he ever again used a player I'd flagged as fragile, he'd be toast, and if he and Vimsy didn't put some effort into training, they would be at risk. The more I pointed out Evans's mistakes, the faster MD would pull the trigger.

Any hint that Evans had tried to shaft the club with overpriced loan deals would also end his nasty, brutish and short stint. Even if I couldn't prove financial misdeeds, if I was clever, there were many ways I could really land Evans in the shit.

Then again, wasn't I supposed to be using this time to learn how to deal with difficult people? It's fair to say I hadn't made much effort to get to know Evans, to find a way to work with him. And I probably never would. Sending Aff 'over the top' didn't just maim our player's hamstring, it killed our relationship.

Long story short, he was a shit manager and he was in my way. Get rid.

The second note read: JACKIE IN

With Jackie as manager, we'd get fantastic training. He'd use young players. The pathway from the youth system to the first team would open and the entire club would be energised. And I could get on with creating the women's team and attracting young players to the club.

My last note on that topic said: MAX IN?

But what if, right, what if... What if I put myself in a position where MD would consider me for the top job? Maybe until the end of the season. Interim until Jackie could get out of his contract at FC United. That said, let's be honest, if I got the job I'd keep it. We'd win most of our games.

There were costs, though. For a start, we'd lose the chance to get next-level coaching. Would Jackie move from FC United to be my assistant? Doubtful!

And being the manager would massively limit how much I could scout. The women's team would get filled with randos and they would probably not win enough matches to get accepted into the women's pyramid next year.

No, the best division of labour was me continuing as DoF, with Jackie as first team manager.

I wanted to sit in the hot seat, though, I can't lie, so I decided I should at least give MD something to think about. And that meant reminding him what an amazing in-game manager I was. I would take control of the youth teams and rack up a few stupendous victories. I'd get the women's team assembled and start crushing those friendlies Inga had arranged.

Less importantly, I needed to arrange some matches to get my discount codes from the January perk. Would those glorified friendlies impress MD? I doubted it.

Getting my coaching badges would. I hadn't neglected my courses, exactly, but I was falling behind with the supervised, assessed sessions. The fastest way would be to use the kids in Darlington, since that's where my course was located. I'd have to check with Cutter if it was still okay with him.

New topic. I wrote: TO LOAN OR NOT TO LOAN

If I wanted to be Machiavellian, I wouldn't bring in a left-back in the January transfer window. Evans would keep having to play players out of position. Would it be worth losing the next five games to get rid of him? Absolutely. But then we wouldn't have much left-sided cover for the rest of the season. Jackie or I could deal with that, but it would limit us, and any limitation would increase the risk of relegation.

This whole line of thinking was tempting but dangerous. I couldn't rely on MD to fire Evans, and if the fossil didn't have the tools he needed, we'd get relegated. The club needed a left-sided body. I emailed the left-back's agent and felt better about it. I'd have to get Magnus Evergreen to test my aura. Must have gained a few light side points with that decision!

Next. PLAYDAR

I had 7,735 experience points, and needed 265. I was absolutely determined to get them that day. The big Sunday Premier League match involved Leeds United. Leeds wasn't all that far from Darlington. About an hour in the car, which used to feel like a trek but was now a jolly little jaunt.

If I managed the twelves and the fourteens, though, I'd get 2 XP per minute while showing my suitability for the big job.

divided by two is 133. I needed to manage 133 minutes to unlock Playdar. The twelves played sixty-minute matches. The fourteens played seventy minutes. Sixty plus seventy is one hundred and thirty. Three minutes short.

I threw the pen across the garden with an annoyed laugh.

I could easily finish the day on 7,995 XP. Absurd! The only way to be sure of getting the XP was to go and watch Leeds. I noped the thought away - I'd found Dani because Henri had reminded me of the community spirit the club was founded on. The viral video resonated with MD because it was so community-minded. The community option wasn't watching a big club with millionaire players, it was managing Chester's kids. I'd do that and find some other match in the afternoon. I would have Playdar by the end of the day.

I went to pick up the pen and couldn't find it. Bad omen! But then it was under my foot and when I picked it up I also found a twenty pence piece. Yes, mate! Let the day begin!

***

Both the 12s and 14s were playing Hope Farm Juniors. I'd punted our best kids from the 12s to the 14s, so we didn't have a ton of quality at the younger age, and neither did the other team. We won 7-4 playing a simple, pass-minded 4-4-2 with no flourishes. I found it boring, Spectrum found it boring, Emma loved every second. She kept making ooh and aww sounds as though she wasn't watching overly competitive little brats, but cuddly kittens.

When one of our kids took a whack on the shin, I delayed the match by a minute while I fussed over him and told him to stay still and asked him to wiggle his toes one by one. But the referee didn't add the time to the end of the half, so it had been a wasted effort. I got a nice hug from Emma, though.

The 14s had a lot more quality. They had the three best players from the 12s, Future (PA 99), and two half-decent guys with PA 25 and 22. Then there was Tyson (58), Benny (40), Sevenoaks (35), Captain (32), and Bomber (30).

I asked Spectrum to set up a 4-1-4-1, pretending it was so I could talk to Future's gran. But obviously it was because I didn't have any formations with a DM and I wanted Future to play there. I set him as playmaker, reminded Tyson he wasn't allowed to shoot, ever, and let them get on with it.

Hope Farm Juniors were pretty dreadful, but they had two guys that caught my eye. One was a left-mid with PA 25. Not great, but we were short a left-sided player. I saw no reason not to bring him over. And the other guy was a PA 29 striker. Neither would ever break into the Chester first team, but they would improve the fourteens squad. And maybe bringing in another striker would be motivational. Not that Benny really needed it. I subbed him off anyway.

"Benny, mate. See their number 9? Good, isn't he? Do you think we should sign him?"

"Him?" said Benny, appalled. "He's rank."

"What does that mean? Rank one? Yeah, I think so, too. He'd give us some options up top. Yeah. Good call, Benny. Back on you go."

Talk about lighting a fire under someone's arse. Benny went on, supercharged, legs pounding, chasing lost causes, defending, getting into position for link-ups.

"That was good," said Spectrum.

"You mean my man-management skills?"

"Yeah."

"That's just to keep it interesting for me. They don't really need it. They're weirdly fired up. Is this a local rivalry or something?"

"No, it's the last game before Das Tournament."

"What?"

"Das Tournament. It's what everyone calls it. All the best teams from the region go to Crewe, play a mini league, then a knockout cup. Matches are pretty short but it's still a long weekend. Brutal. And the standard is high. We always get savaged."

My face lit up. "There's a tournament next weekend? Where we normally lose?" I couldn't believe my luck. The more I thought about it, the more excited I got. "And all the best young players from the region will be there? Holy shit that's perfect."

He pulled a face. "You'll be coming to Das Tournament?"

"Where else would I be? Sounds like heaven."

"It starts on Saturday. What about the first team?"

"What about them?"

He shrugged. Disappointed he wouldn't get to practise his management skills, I supposed. I didn't give a shit. If I could find, like, five talented players and persuade them to join us... I mean, they'd already have clubs, maybe better clubs than Chester. But if they ever got cut, they'd remember how interested I was. Yes, this might not pay off short-term, but with a slightly longer time horizon, going to these kinds of tournaments and saying hello to some of the prospects could really pay off.

And maybe I could persuade some to pop down to Chester for a one-off match. What did the January perk say?

Disruptors Assemble!

Build a team of newly-scouted talents (minimum eleven players), arrange a friendly match, and lead the prospects to victory over their age-appropriate Chester FC counterparts.

Build a team. Not 'register' a team or 'sign' a team. I could get the best eleven kids from the tournament to come to Chester and smash my lot. It would be painful, maybe, for the kids. But they'd get over it and I'd get a 20% coupon code.

God, I love a discount.

With the match still in full flow, I wandered over to the Hope Farm Juniors manager. He wasn't pleased to see me. "What?" he snapped. Most people striding towards him mid-match would be spreading aggro.

I smiled at him. "Are you going to the Crewe thing?"

"Crewe thing?"

"Der Tournament."

"Oh. No. We're much too small for that."

I pointed to his best player. "I'm going to ask your lad there if he wants to come and help us out. It'd be good experience for him."

"Oh!" The guy went through a gamut of emotions. Obviously he wasn't keen for me to steal his players, but I hadn't said I'd be offering him a permanent spot in the squad. I'd only said it was for one weekend, and it was a good opportunity for the kid. "Well," he said, still going through the wringer. I tried to stifle a grin when Benny noticed me talking to the rival boss. He knew what the topic was. He went mental, storming after the left-back and hurling himself in front of their long clearance. He blocked the ball and it went out for a goal kick. Delightful waste of energy. "Just for the day, is it?" said the manager.

"Obviously, if he can make that kind of step up in quality, we'd talk to his parents about what was best for him. I just wanted to let you know what we were thinking. You've done a good job with him. And the left-mid. Yeah, they'll love it. Is it all right if they train with us this week?"

It wasn't lost on him that I'd added another player and two training sessions to my wish list. But what could he do? I could have taken the players without talking to him, and from a sporting perspective, he couldn't stand in their way. Hope Farm wasn't a pathway to anywhere except tractor school. He didn't have a leg to stand on. "Sure, I guess."

Spectrum had come closer to hear what I was up to. I asked him if he'd talk to the kids, since I had to rush off after the match.

I went back to my spot and rubbed my assistant manager's back. She smiled. "What was that all about?"

"Taking that guy's best players."

"That's not very nice."

I didn’t tell her my impulse to recruit more aggressively came from her father. "It's actually good for him," I said. "His team just became a place talented young players can go to get noticed by Max Best. He'll have loads of kids signing up in the next few weeks."

"Oh!" said Emma, smiling. A moment later she said, "Is that true?"

"No," I laughed. "I've absolutely dicked him."

***

We 'only' won four-nil, which wouldn't impress MD, but we were completely dominant and had eighteen shots. Presumably, some parents would message MD letting him know how pleased they were with the change since the Broughton match. A minor step forward, I thought.

Benny had driven himself nuts trying to show we didn't need another striker. The harder he worked, the more chances he ruined. He snatched at shots, hit them too hard, tried to be too accurate, tried hitting them early, late, high, low. At one point he was so far in his head that he cocked his leg to shoot, hesitated, and stayed like that for four seconds.

While the kids drank or ate bananas or chatted with each other about highlights from the game, I took a moment to double and triple check that yes, I really had 7,978 XP in the bank. I'd lost bits of time somewhere along the way, and I'd forgotten the stupid debt! Moronic of me. Twenty-two minutes of football to find! I wanted to rush off, but I had to debrief the kids.

"Lads, good game. Totally on top from start to finish. Man of the match award goes to..." I looked around. Every face turned to mine. This was absolutely meaningless but they wanted it! "Goes to me. I think I did a ten out of ten job managing you. Thoughts?" Lots of eye rolls. Lots of smiles. They knew I was only joshing. "Fine. It's hard to choose between Future and Seven. You guys were quality from start to finish. But I'm giving it to the goalie. You had nothing to do for so long, but when they countered you made two good saves. Great concentration. Love that. We're going to need you all to hit these levels again, next week in Die Tournament. Right? From what I've heard, the other teams will get a lot more shots! I'm going to come and help out, and we're not going there to make up the numbers. I want to win. To that end, there will be a couple of new lads at training. They'll help us out in the tournament. New players. You know what I expect from you when it comes to new players. All right? Benny," I said, summoning him with a head flick.

He came over, shoulders slumped. "Yes, Max?"

"Mate," I said. And waited.

"Sorry," he said.

"What are you sorry for?"

"For playing shit."

I laughed. "You're such a nutjob. You want to see shit, try playing with Chumpy and Tim."

"Who?"

"Yeah, exactly. Look, you're an emotional player, and that can be awesome. You can get fired up and play out of your skin. We'll need that next week. But if you're seeing red, you can't see the goal."

"You want me to calm down?"

"Did you ever see Wayne Rooney?"

"Not much."

"He would get angry, storm around, do all the jobs. The crowd fucking loved it. Managers loved it. But he scored loads of goals. He wasn't angry in the penalty box. He was a killer. It was like... he had a radar telling him where he was. Everywhere else on the pitch he was fiery, but in front of goal he was ice cold."

Benny was absorbing all this. I expected he'd go home and watch loads of Wayne Rooney clips. There were worse ways he could spend his time. "So you're not mad at me?"

"Jesus Fuck! No-one's ever going to be mad at you for working too hard. What the fff..." I walked off, shaking my head. A bit hammy, but I'd found subtlety wasn't the best choice with footballers. I paused and looked at Tyson. He'd been watching, and now he looked away. What did he need? Time, probably. His teamwork was on the up, again. I got the feeling the tournament would be as important for him as it was for me. He could either commit to the ethos or put himself on display for the other clubs.

***

We got into my car and I checked the map. How could I explain what I was about to do? "Babes. I'm hoping to get a tip about a player. I'm going to drive from pitch to pitch and see what's up. Will be boring. I can drop you home if you want."

"No, it's okay. If I get bored, I'll read. I just read a review of a vegan restaurant in Chester. Will you take me?"

"Absolutely." I pulled out of the car park and started my hunt.

"That's it? No hesitation?"

"You've read a review and you want to go. Must be compelling."

"You're interesting."

"No, I'm not."

"Most men are scared of the word vegan. One of my friends uses it as a sort of filter. If a guy asks her out, she says sure, I know a great vegan place. If they make stupid jokes, date's off."

"And if they're into it?"

"They go to Nando's. She's not vegan. Just doesn't want to deal with guys with no imagination."

"I wish you'd brought her to the double date. What are you reading?"

"There's an article about vending machines. I always wanted to own one. Or one of those little robot horses you get outside supermarkets. You're not even awake and people put money in. Yes, please! And MD sent a link. Apparently you did an interview about the Harry video. Some local journalist?"

"Yeah. MD begged me. It was pretty short. Hard to talk about the video without the video and the reporter was no Bingo."

"Well, there's an article."

"Why didn't he send it to me?"

"He did. In the Cliff Daps group."

"Oh, I muted that. You should rename it 'Succession Spoilers'. Jesus."

The first two football pitches I drove to didn't have any matches on. It was too late for Sunday League. There was nothing on the Footy Addicts app. I was driving in the general direction of a five-a-side place. They would definitely have some matches in the evening. Probably. Right? Surely.

And then the morning's excitement came rushing back - a bunch of players in bibs. I parked in front of someone's garage door - an act so obnoxious Emma berated me - and I rushed towards the pitch. Round and round I went, looking for the gate part of the fence. I found it, and clicking the handle open was like busting out of prison. I darted to the touchline and felt the XP stream into me.

Even better, it was a women's match and they had some okay players. A PA 17 midfielder, a PA 14 goalie, and a PA 12 centre-back. Really miles away from the standard I wanted, but they were better than nothing, and nothing was all I had. I would invite them to come to training. After a season or two they would be eased out of the situation, but they would definitely leave with their potential maxed out.

But not long later, I almost forgot about them. My XP stash ticked over to 8,000. How long had it taken me to get from zero to here? Ages. It had been a slog and a half, and that was just the World Cup. I started to retrace my steps. Did I want this? Was Playdar really the best use of my resources? If I got the Contracts perks and found that Ian Evans was trying to cheat the club, that would be the end of him. And I needed to unlock attributes. Formations.

I shook my head. This decision had been made many times over. I bought Playdar.

Playdar. 8,000 XP. This perk directs you to the most talented footballer not in your database who is currently playing football within a certain radius. Can be upgraded.

One small pang of headache later, I had a new icon in my vision. As always, I checked I could hide it and bring it back, and once I was satisfied it would obey me, I took a proper look at it.

It was on the bottom-left of my awareness. A circle. Inside the circle was a piece of clipart representing a radar screen. Concentrating on it made it bigger, and when it was bigger there were three side icons - a number one, a two, and a three.

The whole setup seemed very familiar, and it didn't take long to work out why.

It looked like a quick actions toolbar from video games! So that's how I'd activate the ability. Press this shortcut. And then what would happen? There was only one way to find out...

Although I was almost uncontrollably giddy, I forced myself to calm down. Playdar could wait sixty seconds. I interrupted the match, charmed the players, and got the phone numbers of the three women who had some PA. Emma very slightly fucked things up by getting giddy and saying they should be proud of being my first signings for the women's team. 'Signing' them wasn't really my intention, but I went with it. They would flesh out the squad and there would be other benefits, too. Emma took some photos of me with the three ladies, but I asked them to go to the Deva tomorrow so we could give them Chester kits and retake the pics wearing the right clobber.

"I think we need to talk about you picking up girls right in front of me," joked Emma as we walked back to the car.

"Three nice-looking local girls," I said. "That's a good counterpoint to the whole diversity thing. You know what people are like. I've already seen comments calling us Snowflake FC. As Michael Jordan said, gammons buy replica kits, too. We'll plaster these pics on the website, the socials. Me and three blonde girls-next-door will reassure local bigots." Emma was giving me a strange look. "What?"

"You're being cynical. Realistic. You're normally a bit my-way-or-the-highway."

"You think I shouldn't care about the bigots?"

"Do you?"

"Not really. I don't need more enemies, though." Again I struggled to understand the expression she was showing me. "You're not happy."

"I am, actually. It's nice to see you being sensible. Sometimes I worry... Is that the only reason you chose them? Because they'll look good in the photo?"

"No, they will do a job for us on the pitch. I'd like better players but will I find twenty like Dani? I doubt it. Also, we've got games coming up. We need bodies."

"Bodies."

"Football term. Numbers. Substitutes. Enough guys for all the drills. Bodies. But that wasn't the main event! Let's get back to the car. My tip is about to come."

"Phrasing," she mumbled.

Back in the car - no parking ticket, no aggro, in Manchester it might have been towed already - I wondered what was going to happen. There would be some kind of radar effect leading me to a person who was currently playing football. Would it keep radarring until I found the player? Or would there be a time limit? What could I do to prepare?

First, I turned the ignition. Then I got my phone ready with the map open.

Then... and I couldn't believe how much time and effort had gone into this moment, I prepared to smash the Playdar button.

And as my finger figuratively hovered over the icon, I thought. "This would be a nice time for a cliffhanger."

***

This cliffhanger is sponsored by Player Manager, the story you are currently reading. Why don't you click this link tomorrow and buy the ebook or read for free on Kindle Unlimited? I mean, ideally you'd click the link in such a way that it opened in 24 hours. I wanted to delay this chapter until tomorrow, but that's lame, isn't it?

***

"Do you like cliffhangers?" I asked.

Emma shrugged. "Sometimes."

"Me, too," I said.

I smashed the button and heard a distinctive ping noise. It sounded exactly like the reverberating submarine ping from The Hunt for Red October, one of my favourite movies. The hairs on my neck stood on end.

At the same time as the ping, three more things happened.

First, the Playdar icon greyed out. I didn't like that.

Second, a huge column of yellow light became visible in the distance.

Third, in my 'screen' vision I saw a bright slice of curved yellow light that was angled towards the pillar. When I turned my head, the light moved. When I looked up or down, it disappeared. It was something like a compass pointing towards my destination. It wasn't very obtrusive, and I was able to hide it. Hiding it made no sense, of course.

I got the map, pinched the screen, and looked for football pitches in the approximate direction of the pillar.

"Got it," I said. "Buckle up, we're going in."

Emma was already in her seatbelt, still reading. "Mmm," she said.

Why wasn't she bouncing like I was? This was huge. "Can you be excited, please?"

Without looking away from her phone, she clenched her hand into a fist and made a pulling-down motion. "Whoo whoo," she said, absolutely flat.

I laughed. "I like you sometimes." And I pulled away.

The column of light faded away after about a minute, as did the compass thing. A few minutes later, I pulled into the car park closest to the pitch I felt had to be the right one. I concentrated on the Playdar icon. It was completely greyed out, but the numbers one, two, and three looked just as shiny. They wanted to be pressed!

I hit the number one and with another ping, the column came back. My guess as to which pitch the column was directing me to had been spot on. I needed to get out onto the pitch right away before it faded, if only to see the graphical effect in its full glory. But pressing the button had cost me one experience point, taking me down to precisely zero XP. Did it cost one XP to re-trigger the effect, or did it use whatever I had in the bank? That seemed absurd. Since I had nothing to risk, I tried pressing the number two.

You lack the resources required to process this request (100 XP).

Okay! So I could re-trigger the search once for one XP - very considerate - a second time for 100, and a third for, presumably, a thousand. Or ten thousand. Would it always ping the same player? If a match kicked off between pings, would the pillar switch to a better player if one was around? And why would I ever spend a thousand XP locating a single player? Maybe when I'd bought everything there was to buy in the perk shop, when the curse was fully upgraded, I'd have loads of XP to spend on that kind of indulgence. Yes, that made a certain kind of sense. Old Nick wanted me to keep grinding. Keep watching matches, keep earning. Disposable items would lock me into the grind cycle for a good while to come.

By now I was within sight of the pitch, and sure enough, once I could see the players, the column of light disappeared and the player in question was highlighted in Playdar yellow.

A left-back! The curse had blessed me with a left-back!

"Hallelujah," I said, smiling.

"Who?" said Emma. "Which one?"

"That one," I said, pointing. "The short one."

"They're all short."

Mark Nelson

Scottish/English

Acceleration 4

Handling 1

Stamina 1

Heading 6

Strength 1

Tackling 3

Jumping 3

Teamwork 12

Bravery 8

Technique 4

Pace 3

preferred foot R

Passing 4

Dribbling 2

Finishing 2

CA 1

PA 70

D (RLC)