I had this sat ready to start a new game all weekend, but I didn’t dare actually click the “Start Game” button.

You see, Football Manager scares me. For two reasons. The first is that I worry my life will be over once I start a game. That my head will be full of worries about the holes in my squad to the exclusion of everything else, that instead of working I’ll be pondering tactical changes that could improve my results, etc. The second reason is that I worry the first thing won’t happen, that I’ll start the game, do a couple of friendlies and find that the suspension of disbelief necessary for the game will be unobtainable this time round.

Finally, last night, in bed, I used a random number generator (my wife) to pick my team and started a game as Oxford United. The first thing I noticed was that the board expected me to reach the playoffs. That’s never good. The next thing I noticed was that there was no depth to the squad. Only two strikers and a severe lack of players able to play on the left of defence and the right of midfield. (Or the other way round, I forget.) Luckily for me, Oxford had space in their wage budget, so I bought some players from clubs, signed a few clubless players and got some more in on loan. I now have six strikers, which might be overkill, actually.

Next up, I’m going to have to work out who to put in my first team and then, maybe, play some actual games of football. But that will probably come much, much later.