The Climb #3: Settling In

The wind hit Kat first.
A sharp, sideways Barry wind that always felt personal.
She tightened her grip on her notebook and stepped into the meeting room.
She took a deep breath.

Today mattered.
Not for results.
Not for tactics.
Just to see who she had, and who she could become with them.

Meeting.

The players were already seated when she walked in.
Boots tucked under chairs, quiet conversations fading as eyes moved towards her.

Dozens of faces.
Dozens of quiet expectations.
A whole room waiting to see who their new manager was.

Kat cleared her throat.

I’m Kat. Your new manager. Please don’t worry, the hair is not normally like this.

A ripple of amusement passed through the room – polite and careful.
First days always felt like this.
Everyone reading everyone else without wanting to be caught doing it.

Today’s simple. I want to see how you work. How you move. How you talk to each other. No big speeches. We’ll take everything one step at a time.

A few nods, shoulders lowering slightly, tension settling into something more focused.

We’ll start with a light session outside.

Simple enough for now, she thought, gesturing toward the door.

Let’s get moving.

---

Pitchside.

Players spread across the grass in small warm-up groups, with the experience of people who’d done this hundreds of times.

Kat stood just beyond the touchline, hands in her pockets, watching.
No judgments yet.
No decisions.
Just watching.

A presence settled at her side.
She didn’t need to look to know who it was.

There was calm certainty in her voice.
Not pressure or instruction, just a reminder that the climb had steps, not shortcuts.

The session unfolded with a natural rhythm.
She watched the back line move as a unit – calm steps, clear communication.
Watched the midfield find small triangles of possession.
Watched the forwards drift and adjust, feeling out timing and distance.

Nothing dramatic.
Nothing alarming.
Just a group who understood each other better than she understood them.

Kat finally opened her notebook.

Organised defensive spine.
Reliable wide areas.
Midfield with structure and discipline.
Attackers with quiet presence.

She let the page sit for a moment.
They weren’t trying to impress her.
They were just doing what they knew.
That told her enough for now.

---

Recruitment.

The players filtered out in small groups.
A few stretched.
Someone checked a phone.
Then the pitch was empty.

Kat followed them inside.
The building was already emptying, leaving that stillness that settles once everyone has somewhere else to be.

She slipped back into her office and closed the door behind her.

The folder was still on the desk.
The same page she’d left open stared back at her – squad list, depth chart, asterisks where there should’ve been options.

She sat down and opened her notebook.
No big conclusions.
Just the simple reality of what she’d seen.
They needed reinforcement.

Not a big overhaul, just enough to strengthen the areas that felt thin.
Another defender.
More depth out wide.
A midfielder with presence.
A young player or two who could grow into proper first-team roles.

Nothing she wrote felt surprising.
It matched what she’d expected the moment she accepted the job.

Kat leaned back in the chair and listened to the building.
The players were gone.
Training was done.
Now the work she couldn’t delegate waited in front of her.

Recruitment would need to be quick.
And careful.
And done mostly by her, because the club didn’t have anyone else to do it.

She picked up her pen again.
Time to start making decisions.

And then pre-season arrived.

---

Pre-Season.

It didn’t arrive in a rush.
It just… settled.

Early sessions where everyone tried not to stare too long at the new manager, and friendlies that felt more like auditions than matches.

Trialists came and went.
Some arrived with confidence, some with nerves.
Most tried hard and left quietly.

Kat watched all of it with the same steady focus – the slow work of figuring out what she had and what she didn’t.

By the second week, the pattern was clear.
Training in the morning, a game every few days.
No chaos.
Just information.

One evening, long after most of the squad had headed home, Kat walked back into her office.
She sat at the desk and opened her notebook.

Four names kept coming back to the forefront of her thoughts.

Jea Park – 19

Strong and calm.
Never flustered.
Never chasing shadows.
Young, but with the kind of presence teams grow around.

Notebook: Steady. Reliable.

Nia Jones – 33

Experience you can see without her saying a word.
Organised everyone naturally.
Made the team look more balanced the second she stepped on the pitch.

Notebook: Anchor.

Mateja Despot – 18

Direct and sharp.
Listened well.
Gave the left side something it had been missing.

Notebook: Positive energy.

Lleucu Mathias – 17

Bright touches.
Clear confidence.
Changed the tempo with one action, even in scrappy preseason games.

Notebook: Spark.

None of the decisions felt sudden.
They were just the players who kept standing out while everyone else blended in.

Recruitment wasn’t a grand plan – it was simply filling the obvious gaps. Enough to give the squad shape, not overhaul it.

Outside, the last bit of light had gone from the pitch.
The friendlies would continue.
The trialists would thin out.
And slowly, the squad would become hers.

---

Results

The matches were steady and useful.

Barry Town United 4-0 West Brom

A clean start.
Good movement. Sharp finishing.
Coles lively, Harris direct, the midfield organised.
Plenty to note without getting carried away.

Barry Town United 4-1 Bristol Rovers

A different kind of control.
Wilcox caught her eye.
Cochrane steady.
Jones scoring felt like something settling into place.

Barry Town United 3-0 Real Bedford

Simpler, calmer.
The team looked comfortable doing the basics well.
Harris confident.
Coles finding the right spaces.

Barry Town United 6-0 Mumbles

Everything clicked.
Quick passes, clean decisions, a lot of confidence.
Despot and Mathias linked instinctively on the left.
Not one to over-analyse – just one to note.

Barry Town United 2-2 Oxford United

A reminder the group was still learning.
Slow first half, smarter second.
Breen’s late goal steadied things.

Barry Town United 3-2 Talycopa

A harder test.
Plenty of chances, a few careless moments.
Mathias and Despot showing promise again.
A late wobble, but handled.

Across all six games, a pattern settled in:
not dominance, not chaos – just steady improvement.

Not finished.
Not polished.
Just forming.

A team beginning to feel like a team.

---

The Night Before

Kat pulled the office door shut and stepped into the foyer. Veruca was already there, waiting in that calm way she had.

Outside, the floodlights hummed over the empty pitch. Kat paused, watching the quiet ground.

Not with nerves – not this time – but with the steady recognition of someone returning to something they love.

Tomorrow wasn’t new.
It was simply time to begin again.