Mike Bassett, menedżer

Axed from England, Newcastle, Norwich and Colchester in quick succession - Mike Bassett heeds the call to manage his boyhood club, Wirral County.

After a terrible start to the league campaign it’s up to Mike Bassett to try to turn the club’s fortunes around, the only problem being that they have no fortune to spend. As a result Mike comes up with the idea (actually Karine does) to do a ’Sam Allardyce’ and make a loan signing. But with no money he must use that of his own without Karine knowing and so signs up-and-coming Dutch striker Ronnie Van Needlemans after watching him score several goals on a video sent by his agent.

With Wirral County firmly rooted to the bottom of the table Mike must find a way to get the goals back from his goal shy striker. This calls for Dr. Moss, a hypnotist who can hopefully get the goals out of him. In the next game he scores a hat-trick... in his own net.

With Wirral County looking doomed the fans turn on Bassett wanting results or his head. Not only that but former England wonder kid Kevin ’Tonka’ Tonkinson turns up on his door step. With the help of Bassett and a cold shower a drunken Tonka leads Wirral to a 2-1 victory over Wycombe Wanderers despite the death of his wife in a car-llama incident hours prior.

Following a glorious winning streak reformed alcoholic Tonka has lifted Wirral County out of the relegation zone. Along with his on the pitch brilliance he also causes the relegation rivals Mansfield Town’s bus to crash and injure most of their squad.

With Karine gone for two months, Mike’s world has fallen apart and with one game to go Wirral look set to go down after a dismal run after Tonka’s injury. Mike then finds out that his father threw away the FA Cup final in 1954 for money to help fix Mike’s legs as a boy and allow him to play football.