August

Scottish League One Table

10 — Montrose Magpies FC - 3 - 0 - 0 - 3 - 4 - 10 - -6 - 0 pts

Harry Potter stood on the touchline as the final whistle blew, his head hanging down in defeat. Disappointment didn't even begin to cover what he was feeling in the moment, knowing that his team, Montrose Magpies FC had lost a third straight game, which was the worst start in the club's history, and it was all done on the back of his tactics, his plays, his decisions.

Even worse, it wasn't like he had ended last season on a particular high note, either. He'd been brought in halfway through the season, a young, untested manager, but one who'd been an outstanding player and who understood the game inside and out. It hadn't been enough to save Montrose from a relegation fight, even if they'd managed to stay up after an amazing performance in the tournament, their position now was clear.

If they didn't start winning some games, it was clear that Harry Potter was going to be the man responsible for the team's relegation into League Two.

He stormed off into the dressing room, wondering what the hell he was going to say to the players. He wondered what the hell he was going to do.

Kicking the trash bin, Harry cursed Sirius. His godfather had always had too much money to blow, but buying a football club and putting his godson in charge of it was just a new level of irresponsibility. Now, if Harry failed, he was going to be the cause of great financial loss, too. He was sure Sirius would just laugh at him and promise that he had more where that came from, but it wouldn't make Harry feel any less guilty.

God, he was such a failure.

He needed to figure out a way to turn this season around. His team had been a shambles on the pitch, barely able to score one goal against a really poor Wigtown side. The forwards needed something to help upfront, Higgs had the tendency to completely crumble at the first sign of pressure from the opposition's defense and Flint, their best playmaker, was too busy dropping back to try to shore up their defense to put anything together.

Harry knew he needed to do something. He just wasn't sure what, exactly.

Hermione Granger could already hear the podcast blaring when she walked down the empty corridors to Harry's office. She'd been trying to give him a bit of space after Ron texted her and told her how terrible the game had gone that day, but she knew that they needed to talk eventually.

Her friend had a tendency to wallow, unfortunately, and sometimes he just needed to be snapped out of it. And, well, that's what she was here to do, wasn't it? She'd swung by his favorite takeaway and decided that he just needed a little pep talk to get him out of his funk.

But, if he was already listening to the new episode of Two For Joy that had dropped a mere two hours after the game had ended, maybe she should have come sooner.

"No, no, listen, right? I know that Riddle did a real number on him, right? Like, we all agree that Potter got done dirty and if it weren't for that dickhead, Potter would probably still be playing in the Premier League, and all that —

"Riddle is the worst sort of cunt. You won't hear anything different from me, mate."

"Bet you wouldn't be saying that if he was playing for us, though."

Laughter peeled and made Hermione crack a smile. "Yeah, because then he'd be our cunt. And all the other teams would fucking hate him."

"Exactly. Alright, so like I was saying, we know Riddle did a number on him, but... are we sure that Potter isn't like legitimately brain damaged now?"

"Oh, mate, you can't say that."

"I'm only asking, right. I mean, he was so concussed that he can't play football anymore because one wrong header could like bash his brains in, right?"

"Like a little squash."

"So who's to say that didn't extend to his managerial work? Are we sure that he is functioning at the level that our club needs?"

Hermione stomped in to Harry's office, deciding that she'd heard enough. She pressed the button on the speaker to stop the grotesque musings of the podcast. She would never admit it, but she did listen every now and again, because they did make her laugh, but she normally never did after a loss, when they could be so cruel.

"You shouldn't listen to that drivel," she scolded Harry, pulling out a carton of fried rice. "It will rot your brain."

"You mean my already damaged brain?" Harry quipped back, giving her a wry smile, though she could see in his green eyes that he was hurt by the accusations. He rubbed his hand across his forward, over the jagged looking scar that had been left when he went up for a header at the same time as Tom Riddle in a Cup match.

"Harry, you don't have brain damage," Hermione said firmly. "Surely if you can't believe me telling you this, your friend for over a decade, then you would believe all the scans and cognitive testing that the doctors did for you?"

He shrugged his shoulders. "I don't know. I can't put together football strategy well enough to beat bloody Wigtown," he scoffed.

"I'm not so sure Gaz and Alexander from that podcast could, either," Hermione said, rolling her eyes. "After all, they are the ones recording a podcast in a pub, more concerned with getting pissed than what it takes to run a football club."

"You are only saying that because I'm your friend," he said darkly, before picking through the cartons until he found the little steamed potstickers that he loved. "How is work?"

"Alright," Hermione said with a shrug. She had a day job, working in public health for the City of Montrose, but she also helped out Harry where she could, when she was able. Her eyes narrowed at Harry, who was looking far too innocent for his own good. "Why?"

"I'm going to need to bring someone in —"

"Harry, it will be fine. It's just been a rough start, but you'll figure it out, I swear it," she whined.

"Higgs just can't keep up. He wilts, like a little flower," Harry continued. "I need a striker. A really good striker to get this team scoring some goals or else I can practically guarantee relegation. And that I'll be sacked."

"Do you have someone in mind?" Hermione wondered, knowing that the transfer window was rapidly coming to a close, so he would need to get a move on.

"Not yet, but I am going to find someone," Harry swore. "Even if I have to blow the rest of my budget on him. And that means, I am going to need your help, getting them settled."

Hermione tried not to groan, knowing that Harry was at a low point. "Alright, fine," she agreed after a moment. Last season, she'd helped Harry as a sort of unofficial... player liaison. Helping some of the new players he'd brought in adjust to their new team. "But you owe me."

"Oh yeah? What do you want?" Harry asked with a smirk, leaning back in his chair.

"I know that you are going on a team holiday this year and I want in," she said smartly. "I don't want to do any of the teambuilding nonsense, but... a paid holiday. With a spa package!"

"Done, I'll make sure to pencil it in," Harry said smiling. "What would I do without you, Hermione?"

"Completely rot your brain with terrible podcasts?"

Harry laughed. "Speaking of, I think it's time that I finish the episode," he said, pointing his little remote control at the speaker and starting up the audio feed again.

"Speaking of, we have a question here from listener MagsFC76, who asks, If you had to get one body part smashed by Tom Riddle, which would it be and why?"

Montrose was a small sort of town where you couldn't really get away with being anonymous as a regular person and you certainly couldn't get away with being anonymous when you were the football manager of the local club. Or, if you were a famous former professional footballer, Harry Potter.

That was why Harry liked Luna's cafe, the Dirigible Plum. Luna was a very odd sort of bird, but she didn't treat him any differently from anyone else when he came in for breakfast. She didn't fall for Sirius's flirting, either, when his godfather joined him. And, she didn't bother them too much when they holed up in one of the back booths to talk about strategy over Full Scottish breakfasts, which Harry knew he really shouldn't indulge in as much as he did.

"Are you really sure that he's the one that you want?" Sirius asked, looking at the picture of the striker Harry had selected through painstaking work. "He looks a bit poncy."

Harry rolled his eyes at his godfather. "You look a bit poncy," he fired back, annoyed that he was being questioned. Only, that wasn't really fair. He was annoyed at the whole situation, the season, the pressure that he was under.

"Yeah, but he's a true blue ponce. I can tell," Sirius said, barking out a laugh. "He'll cost enough."

"He'll cost everything we have left in the coffers for this season," Harry explained with a wince. It was a gamble, but it was one that he knew that he had to make.

Sirius whistled low. "Harry, when I bought this club, there was no one else I would even dream about taking the lead job," he said, after a moment. "If you think that this Italian striker is going to be the one to turn things around, I'll make the calls."

"He's actually British," Harry said, though Malfoy had been playing in Italy long enough for the country to make an impression on him. "Yeah, I'm sure."

"Are you sure he's going to want to come down to our level?" Sirius asked, not nearly as certain as Harry was that this was all going to go to plan.

"It's just a year long loan. I know that we are... well, at least two levels down from where he is currently at, his current club was relegated last season anyway, and rumor has it he doesn't get on with the new manager," Harry explained. If he did, Harry was certain this loan spell would never work. "Just explain how much this will pad his stats. He'll be a goal scoring machine and once he's back here in the UK, the bigger clubs might give him a new look."

"Done," Sirius said, pushing his fried tomato around his plate. "Hopefully he can settle in quickly. Higgs has been abysmal this year, hasn't he?"

"Mm," Harry said in agreement. He wasn't looking forward to telling his player that he was about to do a long time on the bench now that they were bringing some new blood in. But, being the manager meant that you had to be a bit ruthless sometimes if you wanted to win.

And Harry, well, he wanted to win badly.

Once the contracts were signed and all the medicals were cleared, Harry Potter sat in his office watching highlight reels of Malfoy scoring in his last three years at Serpeverde, even though he didn't need to. Harry and Malfoy had come up together at Hogwarts Academy, the pair of them joining as thirteen year old lads. They'd hated each other from the beginning, each gunning for a call up to the higher levels of football.

Back then, Malfoy had started as a central defensive midfielder, before the under 17s manager got a look at him and decided that he might make a good striker as well. Malfoy had flourished there, giving Harry a run for his money. Despite his drive to practice and practice until he could run plays in his sleep, Malfoy never had the natural ability Harry did.

But, here he was, still playing, while Harry couldn't head a ball if he wanted to keep his brain. One wrong knock would send him back to hospital.

Malfoy's time as a CDM was evident in his highlight videos. His pace was insane, even though he was nearing thirty, and his acceleration was even better. Sometimes he'd get past defenders before they even registered it. He was left-footed, but no slouch with his right, either, and God, his crossing ability was...

He was going to be an absolute menace in their league, Harry thought, with a grin on his face.

"Watching old videos of yourself, again?" Hermione asked, snagging his attention from his doorway. He'd invited her there, because he knew that keeping Malfoy happy at the club was down to Hermione, as well.

"Not me," he said, restarting the video and leaning back so that Hermione could get a look at him. "That's our new striker, Malfoy. He will be arriving in a couple of days."

Hermione didn't know Draco Malfoy, had none of the history that Harry did, but she took one look at his smirking face after he'd tricked a Keeper with a penalty shot to know that she didn't like him. "What's so special about him?" she asked.

"Aside from being a first rate striker?" Harry asked, with a scoff. "We are punching well above our weight class with him. Honestly, we shouldn't have even been able to get him. Montrose is a big step down from where he should be."

"How did you get him, then?" Hermione asked, sounding uncertain. There was a catch — there had to be.

"Spent all the rest of my funds on him," Harry said, looking at her like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"Harry, you didn't!" she scolded, wondering what had gotten into her friend. "What if you have injuries? What if he doesn't suit our style of play?"

"Oh, we will make our style of play suit him," her old friend reassured her. "And injuries will be tricky... we will have to manage things very carefully, but I think if we are responsible, we can get through the season without any issues."

"It seems like you are leaving a lot of things up to fate," Hermione said, feeling cross. Of course, when left up to fate, a lot of things had seemed to work out in Harry's favor. Until they didn't. Until he'd gone up for the wrong ball and come down without a career any more.

"So you understand then — I need Malfoy to do well here," he said, his green eyes pleading with her for an unasked favor. "And more so, I need him to be happy here in Montrose, so he will help pluck this team out of the relegation fight we are currently in for."

Hermione narrowed her eyes at him, again. "What do you need from me?" she asked.

"You know that you are the best player liaison that I could have ever asked for," he responded, buttering her up a little too much. "You've managed to help Flint and Pucey. Dean still can't stop talking about how easily you made his transition here. There isn't anyone else I would trust to help Malfoy settle in here."

"Uh-huh," Hermione said, not impressed for a second.

"After all, he's been living in Italy for the last couple of years," Harry went on. "He'll need to find a flat — a good flat, mind you — and he'll need help around town, figuring out where everything is. He might need a bit of help with paperwork and the like."

"I am not a personal assistant," she reminded him. She wasn't going to be running off after some stupid footballer who couldn't figure out how to go grocery shopping, just because Harry thought he was going to score marginally more goals than Higgs could.

"I doubt that he will even bother you after the first couple of weeks!" Harry lied. He remembered what a pain in the arse Malfoy could be during the best of times, but he wasn't above using Hermione's friendship to get what he wanted. Just one fucking win.

"Fine," Hermione said, her ire coming through loud and clear. "But only because you are my oldest friend, Harry. And only for a couple of weeks, while he gets settled."

"And, Hermione?" Harry said, knowing that he was pushing it even though she was agreeing to help. "I really need things to go smoothly with Malfoy, so do you think you could... you know, use your special skills to just make sure that everything is really perfect?"

He could see the little muscle in her jaw twitching, that she was trying not to snap back at him for being quite so impertinent when she'd already agreed to do him a massive favor. "Harry," she warned, before taking a deep breath to calm herself. "You know what? Okay, I will. Because that means he will settle in quicker and I will have less to deal with."

"Thanks Hermione!" Harry said, brightly. "Listen, when we go on holiday, I will make sure you get a suite with a massive bed and... and a great view!"

"You better," she cautioned. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go find a flat to lease, because I'm certain the club hasn't done that yet."

She was striding out of his office and down the hall faster than she could wiggle her nose. Harry let out a sigh of relief, until he looked down, eager to resume watching the tape, only to find that his mouse had mysteriously vanished.

"Welcome to Two for Joy, I'm your host Gaz and with me I have Alexander and Nigel. How you doing today boys?"

"Alright, alright."

"Big news out of the Park, then today, isn't that right? We've had an announcement that the Club has signed a striker from Serpeverde in Serie B today."

"To be fair to Serpeverde, they were in Serie A until they were relegated at the end of the last season."

"How good could this geezer be, then?"

"Don't want to get the stink of relegation on us, do we? We have enough of that on our own, thank you very much."

"I'll tell you, I've seen some highlights of him. He's called Draco Malfoy and he looks — well, let's just say, I'm wondering how in the world we've signed him. He looks the absolute mustard, doesn't he?"

"He's a bit pretty for my tastes, but yeah, I saw a compilation of his free kicks and it's something else, isn't it?"

"Let's fucking go!"