KT Hotspur

KT Hotspur was a professional football club from Candelaria And Marquez, based initially in the city of Khatib-Gassett and later the nearby town of Rose of Sharon. The team was one of the younger top-flight sides in the country during the International Era, having been founded by local coal tycoon Lawrence Adamczyk in order to compete in the new CMSC.

While winning only one league title, in the CMSC’s tenth outing under manager Fred Ristic, the Spur were a consistent factor thanks to Adamczyk’s funding, despite his penchant for hiring and firing managers at a dizzying rate, star players including Paulson Gates, Roberto Crúz and Floyd Brown. Fans would maintain for decades after that the league’s antipathy towards the upstart franchise’s title success was the reason for their plush Rosebury Park home being stripped of the right to host matches ahead of CMSC XI on supposed safety grounds. The club spent many years thereafter at the comparatively dilapidated Snowy Park Athletics Centre (‘The Valleys’), a ground taken to the hearts of the club’s small fanbase who consistently resisted the owners’ attempts to move the team elsewhere.

Early into the International Era control was passed into the hands of Adamczyk’s son Lee, who proved more inclined to back managers for long spells – as well as even less willing to listen to the whims of the supporters. With World Cup 44 in mind, the club moved to an ornate new home in ‘Rosasharn’ – an attempt to change the team’s name to reflect this being blocked by the league – though the increasingly poor state of the Valleys arguably left him with little alternative. On-field, while the team would never again trouble the top three, they also seldom finished outside the top ten and were never relegated.

Following his father’s death, the younger Adamczyk became ever more autocratic, declaring himself President, Vice-Chairman and Director of Sporting Affairs, and his late father Eternal Chairman, while another attempted name change – with KT to be replaced by ‘LA’ – was dropped after fan protests. Almost unique among leading Candelariasian sides in never becoming foreign-owned or establishing a close relationship with any particular country; the Spur instead earned the dubious honour of being the league’s most defensive outfit – almost regardless of who was in the dugout, though peaking under former Praying2God striker and manager Thomas Larson’s legendary seven man defence – and indeed the fans would ultimately wear the distinction as a badge of pride and react negatively to attempts to introduce a more free-scoring style of play. No CMSC1 club registered more drawn matches during the International Era.

With the Adamczyk family’s finances becoming dwarfed by those of foreign investors in other clubs, KT Hotspur focused increasingly on its Ashprington academy as the years went by, and their youth development programme proved unexpectedly successful. Full-back Gwynfardd Lopulalan became of C&M’s, and their own, all-time greats, and an icon for Rose of Sharon and Khatin-Gassett’s large Bettian community, and was joined among the club’s hall of fame by the likes of Juan Carlos Revault, Yasser Zaghloul, Harvey Vavasour and, of course, Love Cummins. The improbable reinvention of Yaforite Vorin Dariegan from second striker to out-and-out goalscorer also made him one of the club’s, and the CMSC’s finest forwards, the club also making favourite sons of adopted locals Karl Matthews of Bostopia and former St Samuel striker Guiseppe Abellardo.

After several caretaker stints an aged Abellardo would prove to be the club’s final manager. With no CMSC after XXXIX the club was rapidly wound up – the White Palace finally becoming, as had long been feared, the White Elephant.

Stadium
KT Hotspur’s original ground was the plush Rosebury Place, until the tenth CMSC season saw the stadium lose its licence to host top-flight matches, owing to safety concerns. The club moved to the Snowy Park Athletics Centre (or, ‘The Valleys’); a dilapidated arena but one which was soon taken to the hearts of the locals – to the point that the fans repeatedly rejected efforts by the Adamczyks to move the team elsewhere in later years. During the XXXI season however, a stand collapsed during a C&M international – causing the game to be postponed (and later moved to the Khatib Together Stadium), though thankfully resulting in only minor injuries to the small number of travelling supporters from Land de Wood, the home of KT Hotspur’s feeder team Southern Village. The club were forced to move once again as a result, playing the second half of the season in Saurin.

For XXXII, the Spur mobed into the White Palace, a 41,472 all-seater arena on the edge of town. Its presence in Rose of Sharon made it the smallest city to host games in the C&M half of World Cup 44. Though outwardly ornate – featuring twiddly columns, cherubs, bosoms, and art deco sculptures redolent of the city’s industrial past – inside it was a largely unremarkable, thoroughly modern, two-tier box. A single exception was a stand behind one of the goals – which was a deliberate recreation of The Valleys, albeit with blue seating and using modern materials, and added to placate those home fans unwilling to fully surrender the rustic charm of their former ground.

Notable CMSC1 International Era players
Goalkeepers
 * Ryan Gonzaléz
 * Joel Sbaïz
 * Paolo Thorpe
 * Greg Tipping
 * Cobus van Linschoten

Defenders
 * Love Cummins
 * Samual Fortal
 * Karl Matthews
 * Junichi Inaki
 * Agamemnon Knight
 * Gwynfardd Lopulalan
 * Cullen Maxwell
 * William Naysmith
 * Nic Noble
 * Juan Carlos Revault
 * Chris Stewart
 * Özkan Yalçin

Midfielders
 * Neville Bagshaw
 * Noah Collins
 * Tom Darkless
 * Miguel González
 * Jordan Hawker
 * Aaron Kortsarian
 * Blagojce Makedonski
 * Flag of Ex-Nation.png Wally Milton
 * George Morrison
 * Panos Petropoulos
 * Darren Rass
 * Ras Rataran
 * Robin Smith
 * Daniel Tiller
 * Harvey Vavasour

Forwards
 * Flag of Ex-Nation.png Giuseppe Abellardo
 * Vorin Dariegan
 * Allen Gallagher
 * Stephen Smith
 * Yasser Zaghloul