Scottish Email Soccer League uses MSWL Olmec software courtesy of Al Sellers (pictured right) from America.   48 SESL managers compete in 3 divisions to be crowned League Champions in this FREE Play-By-Email soccer game. 

ARCHIVE SESL PIG MONTHLY INTERVIEWS 

Pig Interview - November 
Manager Focus - QUEENS PARK  
Nigel Smith has just seen his QP team earn their first Div 1 win (1-0 over the mighty Hamilton). Below Nigel tells us how he got into Play By Mail games and where he can take QP in SESL, plus his love of Ipswich Town.

Playing football games is surely something only for kids? Wrong!! Football PBeMers never grow old - we are just a bunch of over-sized kids who are addicted to the thrill of the game - scrolling through our matches with sweaty palms and a furrowed brow. 

True, I first got into PBM games as a 12 year old footie-mad kid with more spare time than I could care to mention. Now, 20 years later I'm still playing the games, although I have a lot less time. As I mentioned, I have been playing Play-by-mail games for nearly 20 years now and for about 5 years I was the sports games editor for the hobby mag 'Flagship'. At that time I was playing upwards of 60 games - mostly football management (and mostly free trials). Now I play just one, called Kickabout which is easily the best game I found in my time in PBM. 

But times move on and one day I noticed on the Ipswich Town FC supporters chat-list that a guy called Gareth Cruz (STJ manager) had the acronym G.O.A.L. after his signature and some sort of description of an e-mail PBM. So I visited the website and thought "I'll have some of this!", mailed Gareth and got some details. G.O.A.L. was full at the time so I visited MSWL and got the details of SFLSL (Mike Morton) and SESL from there. 

The SESL season before last I took over QP from Graham McDermott as he moved to CLB and I quickly moved QP towards relegation before finally working out where I was going wrong and avoiding the drop into the third division. Graham had left me with a decent squad - top half potential certainly - but I don't think even he thought QP were capable of promotion in my first full season in charge.

 But in fact we stormed to the top of the table, were passed by Hearts and then Ayr but maintained promotion form all season and finished third. Last seasons success was built on the firm foundations of a strong keeper (Ray Feist), a strong, and young defence and the goalscoring of Christos Kostis. Ageing has now left us with on paper the weakest squad in the top flight but two opening 0-0 draws suggests we may be able to hold our own in the 1st division, maybe even survive relegation? The key players for QP this season will be Feist again in goal, Bramble, Frail and Donaldson in defence, Holland in midfield and Kostis up-front. The rest of the team need replacing with youngsters over time and a lot will depend on my ability to coach Smith, the new keeper, and Bent, the new striker, whilst not throwing away any silly points. Every point this season will be crucial if we are to avoid relegation. 

I have now managed to join GOAL as an expansion team - Delirious Blues (DB) - who are holding our own in mid-table. My SFLSL team was a nightmare to start off with but ISB (Ipswich Super Blues) should do well this season. Finally I also joined Psychoshoccer as Widnes Saracens (WIS) where we finished rock bottom - so overall a mixed bag of performances and I can only hope to improve as time goes on. 

Some more about me then - I am married with two little girls which keeps me pretty busy. Until recently I lived quite close to both Fulham and Chelsea, and not far from Brentford from Division 2. But I have now started a job in Birmingham and am living in Worcester. However, I am an Ipswich Town supporter! I have supported Ipswich for as long as I can remember - I remember cutting pictures of Ipswich players out of magazines at primary school! I started supporting them because I liked the colour blue!! Of course those were the days when Ipswich were consistently up amongst Englands elite when Sir Bobby Robson won us the F A Cup and UEFA Cup, narrowly missing out on the League title on three occasions. Things have never been that good again, although George Burley took us to 5th in the Premiership a couple of seasons back before ultimately relegating us the following season. In fact Joe Royle has today been appointed the new Ipswich manager which I'm a bit disappointed about but with our current league position and poor form, something had to change. 

As for Scottish football, well I've always had a soft spot for Dundee United since their Eurpoean successes in the '80s and Queens Park are one of the other clubs I look out for every now and again - although this season looks like being a long hard one for them - lets just hope it isn't for the SESL version!!!

Nigel, QP manager in SESL.

Pig Interview - 
November Monthly Manager Focus  

  DUMBARTON - Martin Fallon  www.dumbarton.latest-info.com

“SESL? What’s that?”… That was my question to my old flatmate when he brought home his team roster and was selecting his team for that weekend’s matches. After a quick explanation of the rules, I wanted in, and this was way back towards the end of season two. Now here we are now at the end of season eight, with three divisions as opposed to the two when I first joined, and a lot more teams. 

Huge well done to Mark for keeping SESL going!

 Some of you older guys may know my old flatmate – Dan Black – former manager of Ayr United (hello Dan if you are reading this!). Like I said, when Dan introduced me, I joined the waiting list and bizarrely, the team that came up for me was none other than Ayr’s fiercest rivals Kilmarnock!

 Back then, Killie were bottom when I took over with ten games left, and an incredible run of just one defeat in these matches saw us avoid relegation by the skin of our teeth. Season three saw us once again struggle, with the only really good players being Wingers that I had trained and coached! Unfortunately I neglected the defence to do this and I entered the end-of-season play off’s, which I won to remain in Division One (does this count as silverware Mark?).

 Just before Season Four, I left Kilmarnock as I was returning to University for my final year and didn’t want any distractions. Unfortunately though, most of the pubs sold a thing called alcohol, and that was enough distraction for me!

 After leaving University in May 2000, I worked for Bank of Scotland in the Stationery department, which was just a temporary job to keep my bank manager happy. After a while there, I moved to Norweb Telecom in Manchester, which was doing the job I wanted to do, but was not permanent.  A few months later, when a full time contract was not forthcoming, I left, and walked down to that nice place, The Job Centre.

 What an experience! I was out of work for four months, but they were surely the longest four months of my life. Its crazy really – when you are working, you long to be off, but when you are off like that, you really long to be working! Anyway, September 2001, I joined Edge Hill University, as a member of staff though, not a student. It was great! Getting money I mean, not the job, and I walked after three months as I hated it.

 The job I went to was a Mortgage Analyst for the Co-operative Bank in Manchester, and believe it or not, I am still there over nine months later (a record!). It’s a good job, and an Analyst is what I want to be as I was an Analyst in my placement year (when I joined SESL), and I really enjoyed it.

 Anyway, that’s brings us up to date really. Since I had a full time job that I intend to hold down for a bit, I thought about choosing some fantasy football teams for this season, and for some reason, SESL popped back into my head! So I emailed Mark, and quicker than I expected, I got back in as manager of Dumbarton. There was eight games left, and a quick look at the table found Dumbarton second bottom of Division Two!

 Somehow though I “did a Killie”, and just one loss out of the last eight matches saw Dumbarton survive. Looking at the team, if I can make a few shrewd trades, I believe I can challenge for the league next year, so watch out Division Two!

Key player for DUM in season 9?   Derek Townsley (pictured left) needs to prove his worth.    He is a 2/24 MA and last season hit the net 5 times in 22 league games, but more is expected from this player.   His squad number was 12 last season as he was being trained heavily, but he will be one of the first picks in season 9 and must shine to see DUM build on the great form shown towards end of season 8.

 Right that’s it for now I think. Oh yeah, I suppose you are wondering what team I support aren’t you? Well, and you’ve got to promise that you won’t laugh after I tell you, I support Runcorn. We play in the Unibond League, which is one underneath the Nationwide Conference, and I watch them home and away every week.

 One more thing, check out the Dumbarton SESL Webpage. You can access it by typing in http://www.dumbarton.latest-info.com. I have put a section on there with everybody’s contact details for a quick reference, as well as some useful links. If you want your details removing, then let me know. Have a good season nine everyone!

  Martin, DUM boss in SESL.

Pig Interview - July Monthly Manager Focus 
  CLYDE FC - Phil McIntosh
We are proud to introduce the brains and fur behind the operation of Clyde FC. These pictures have been a long time coming, but they are current. Clyde got a little jumpy with the trigger paw, so there's plenty of photo's for Mark to chose from. Clyde FC is owned and chiefly operated by Phil McIntosh, in Kirksville, Missouri. Phil is an attorney serving the Second Judicial Circuit as a Guardian ad Litem, representing children in juvenile court, primarily in abuse and neglect cases. In addition to Clyde FC, Phil operates the Missouri Legal Beagles in MSWL, FLATNZ and GOAL, as well as Valencia in MSLF. His current hobby is the community theatre, where he is the President of the Board of Directors. He has directed and/or starred in numerous productions, but his latest role features Phil as a high-stakes gambler in the musical "Guys and Dolls." The best part of the whole deal is that Phil cannot sing or dance, but every night his singing parts and dancing parts keep increasing. "That's okay," purrs Clyde. "Phil can't manage a soccer team either, but that doesn't stop him from participating in SESL season after season. Phil singing and dancing? That's worth the price of admission alone." Speaking of Clyde, it's time that you met the pets behind the owner of Clyde.

Clyde is a gray tabby. If Mark is so kind to include the picture, please direct your attention to it at this time. That look is Clyde giving his best Robin "Red Card" Dewar look. He is at work on the computer putting together lineups for another tough SESL session!...or perhaps this photo was taken after receiving yet more terrible news of consecutive Clyde FC losses from the past season. Even though the team won only one regular season game the entire year, the cat promises more this time around. "I wring my paws in eager anticipation," mews Clyde. Indeed, Clyde FC has already turned in two victories for seven points in four games. Fun fact: Phil acquired the rights for Clyde when Mary spotted him on a trade board at the vet's office.

Calvin is the heavyweight of the team. The orange tabby weighs in at a whopping thirty pounds, but is as gentle as, well, a pussycat so long as you stay off his side of the bed. That, of course, begs the question, "Where does a thirty pound cat sleep? Anywhere he wants!" Calvin is seen in the attached photo presenting a requisition form to acquire yet another GK. That's our motto here at Clyde FC...you can never have too many GK's!  Fun fact: Mary (pictured below with Phil) found Calvin nearly five years ago on a county road on a dark and stormy night. He was cold, lonely and hungry, but hasn't stopped eating since he arrived!

We have been around PBEM soccer for quite some time, although we have precious little hardware to show for it. Clyde FC began as an expansion team in division two, but quickly earned its way up to the premier group with aggressive strikers solid coaching. Something went dreadfully wrong one season ago, however, and Clyde FC plummeted back to its origins. The cats are diligently working to re-claim their seat at the division one dinner table. In the meantime, they enjoy their time in SESL at whatever level they may be. Some of our favorite things about SESL? Too numerous to mention, but we cannot close the interview without identifying the single-most important element of SESL: the managers. You're all quite a crazy bunch of characters, and the best part of PBEM soccer is getting to know you on the field and in the press box! Oh, and another great thing about SESL? Mark's watch.

Phil, CLY boss.

Email the SESL commissioner .  

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