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Lochlin Highet

Football Manager: Teen shows Tommy Sloan how it's done in leading Auchinleck Talbot to Champions League

Arsen Hovhannisyan, Ignacio Checa and Yeiner Zambrano – not exactly names you would associate with Auchinleck Talbot.

But for Jack Shaw, they are just a few of the superstars gracing the Beechwood Park pitch in his Football Manager career.

The 19-year-old Londoner has adopted the West of Scotland League Premier Division side as his virtual team – leading the Ayrshire club from non-league to the Champions League in just nine years.

And on the way he even managed to finish a season 'invincible' – an unbeaten Scottish Premiership season in 2030/31 amassing 100 points – a whopping 23 points ahead of Rangers, and 16 more than Celtic.

Despite having never set foot in Ayrshire, the Bromley die-hard decided he was the man to replace Tommy Sloan in the virtual dugout.

The side caught his attention after their heroic win against Championship side Hamilton Accies in the Scottish Cup – and he decided that he wanted to lead the underdogs to glory.

His side is mostly made up of 'regens', which is computer-generated players created as the game moves on in time.

But he did manage to lure English Premiership star Jacob Ramsey to Beechwood from Aston Villa during his save.

Speaking to Ayrshire Live, Jack said: "I picked Talbot after they beat Hamilton this season in the cup. I love an underdog story and after looking at what it meant, there wasn’t any other option for me.

"Leading Auchinleck to an invincible season, I didn’t think it was going to happen. I had to play Rangers at Ibrox on the last game of the season and if I avoided defeat I would break the 100-point barrier and become invincible.

"They missed a penalty, that was probably the best moment of the entire save and my goalkeeper then became my favourite regen.

"As for in real life players, my favourite was Craig McCracken who scored the winning goal to get me promoted to the football league and was my club captain until he left the season I got promoted to the Championship."

Jack added: "I haven’t started my season in Europe yet, I’ve taken a few days to process what I’ve done and decide how I’m going to go about playing in the Champions League as I lack homegrown players.

"But when I play in Europe that will be the best moment of the entire save for me. The first season was a title scrap with Pollok and now I hope to be able to share a virtual pitch with some of the greats of the game."

Jack admits he'd love to visit Beechwood to see his favourite stars in the flesh – but admits it's challenge due to how far away he stays from Ayrshire.

He said: "I do eventually plan on visiting Beechwood Park, but living in London and not having the type of friends who will travel to Scotland with me to watch does make it difficult. However, I’m sure I’ll convince them one day."

Jack has previous success with smaller teams in the game, including two notable careers in the Nordic countries.

He said: "I have been playing Football Manager religiously since FM20. The two saves that stick in my head are Bodø/Glimt in Norway where I managed to win the Champions League after nine years and Dalvik/Reynir in the third tier of Iceland where I qualified for Europe but it was the end of the game cycle."

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