Suggestions: Improvement of Gameplay for Managers

I have come up with a few suggestions of improvements on Football Manager possibly in FM10, if not in future incarnations.

I currently am doing a journeyman career game on FM 09 and I am loving it. It has gotten me to 2016, my furthest to date, as in my previous saves I was always Manchester United but could last no longer than 2012 due to it being too easy to dominate. My career in my current save has seen me being in charge of HMD, Boluspor, FC Nurnberg, Real Zaragoza, Aberdeen, Boca and currently Genoa F.C..

Having switched around so many clubs, I find there are a number of features or improvements that future FMs could have which would improve the enjoyment of a long term career game.

Favoured Personnel/ Icons/ Legends

I believe this issue has been reiterated many times by other members of the forum, where having managed a LLM or low reputation club to the pinnacle of success, and attaining at least a Favoured Personnel status in the process, all effort is gone to waste once he/she leaves the club. I personally also find this very frustrating considering the amount of time and effort needed to get a LLM club to succeed in the long run. I do hope SI really does fix this.

Press interviews on previously managed clubs

Following from the above mentioned suggestion, I do think it would be a nice touch if managers do get asked on what they think the odds are on their previously managed clubs winning a cup final or league. Currently in game, we can see press statements of reporters interviewing FPs/Icons/Legends of clubs “who are the danger men they see in key matches or cup finals”. I believe it would be a nice feature to have with such media interactions with us players of the game. For example, having taken Boluspor to winning the Turkish Premier League and Champions League, I would likely be named as Favoured Personnel at least. If I were to join another club the following season, and it so happens Boluspor is involved in a title deciding match or CL final once again, the media could pose questions to me similarly like they do now, e.g. “Who are the danger men we identify in the team playing against Boluspor?”, “Who do you favour to win the final?”, etc.

Clubs’ approaches

Another feature I find a bit lacking. I think the game should have multiple approaches when trying to poach a manager from one club to another. We currently have news reports stating that Manager X is one of the favourites to be the next manager and thereby asking whether Manager X would be interested in the job itself. I think there should be a follow up on this or further interactions between club and manager can be added.

E.g. If Manager X were to indicate interest, the Club Y could approach Manager X’s current club, Club X, and buy out his contract on the spot. In the case where Manager X’s contract is too hefty to pay out, Club Y could then suggest to Manager X to either resign (Option 1), inform Manager X that they will negotiate Club X to lower down the severance pay (Option 2), or negotiate a financial package with Manager X that gives him a lower salary for the first year or so/ give him no “signing on” bonus (Option 3), so that they can afford to outright buyout his contract. I believe a good real life recent example of this would be Sunderland negotiating with Wigan’s chairman to bring Steve Bruce over. I do hope FM can implement something similar to this in game. As currently, I find it a little frustrating when I find clubs willing to hire me but do not do so in the end, which I am going to hazard a guess and state that it is because of their unwillingness or inability to buy out my contract with my current club. I mean without being boastful in any manner, I cannot see why ingame 2016, Everton which is still a EPL club with secure finances will hire Tony Mowbray (who has not won anything in game till date), instead of hiring me (won 5 league titles and 1 European competition with 5 different clubs), especially after I indicated my interest in the job at Everton. In fact, I even quit my job at Boca Juniors so that Everton would be more willing to hire me, in the end it turned out to be a mistake =P. If I am not mistaken, clubs in game do not take manager stats into account, but look at manager reputation instead, thus I doubt my low “club loyalty” and low “domestic player bias” stats affected my chances of being awarded the Everton job, and I do believe my reputation should have been higher than Tony Mowbray’s (I cannot confirm this as I do not use FMRTE), therefore I do feel a little foolish to have quit my job at Boca and ending up with naught:D. Perhaps there should be some stronger indication of interests from clubs or indications of what barriers they face when trying to hire us players to become their new managers.

Filter Option when applying for new jobs

Currently in game when a player is jobless, I believe there are 5 options for us to choose from when trying to apply for clubs and we choose to go on a vacation at the same time to speed up the process. “Higher Reputation Clubs”, “Any Clubs”, “Top Division Clubs”, “Lower Division Clubs”, “Bottom Division Clubs”. I was hoping that perhaps SI could give us a filter option of the countries or leagues we are interested in working in instead of giving the 5 generic options.

For example, perhaps when I intend to go on a vacation while awaiting my next job offer, I click Top Division Clubs, and select countries Spain, France, England as my preferred destinations. This would then filter off unnecessary job offers from other clubs in this generic “Top Division Clubs”. What happened to me last night when was I had quit my Boca Juniors job and not received the Everton job. I clicked the “Top Division Clubs” option, “Return from Holiday when offered a job”, and went on holiday indefinitely. The next 2 job offers I received were from Houston Dynamo in USA and Connah Quay in Wales. With due respect to the 2 clubs, I would not want to manage them and I know that my reputation in game to be pretty high having received job offers from Barcelona and Juventus a couple of years back. That being said though, I could have clicked higher reputation clubs to prevent job offers from such clubs, but I did not want to do that as I wouldn’t have mind taking charge of the 15-20th position of the EPL, Primera Liga or French Ligue 1. Therefore I think this addition of a countries filter after clicking which division the player would be interested in managing would be a useful addition for SI to include.

Thank you all for reading this. I welcome any feedback and I do hope that a member of SI will also comment on the above mentioned suggestions.

aww nobody replied. so i will. i didnt read it because its too long. but good job

Good read and some valid points especially with the Applying For Jobs bit. I wish you could choose the league not just a 'higher rep. club'

RE: Manunited2009, why bother replying if you didn't read it. Just shows you are lazy and a waste of oxygen

i really like your ideas

Thanks Geronimo360 and Aim Less for your support of my ideas.

Although I must add it is a bit weird seeing 136 views on my thread and only getting 3 replies.

Nevertheless, thank you to the two of you.

As for manunited2009. I guess the only useful thing you helped me do is inadvertently helping me bump my thread up. So thanks!

aww nobody replied. so i will. i didnt read it because its too long. but good job

This made me nearly laugh out loud.

On topic, the first issue has been mentioned before but it definitely needs improvement. The second issue is a solid suggestion. It would be a nice touch to be asked how the team you took from BSN/S to European glory will fare in the upcoming season. Or in the FA Cup Final. Or in their last day relegation battle. This would require more "targeted" triggers than press conferences currently do but it could add a level of immersion.

The third issue is interesting, although not something I have contemplated much. In general I would agree that the explanations for receiving/not receiving a job should be a little more specific. For example, "Everton chose a bum off the street for the manager position because buying out your contract with your current club proved too expensive". Or "Aston Villa hired Carlo Ancelotti because his reputation proceeds him; they've never even heard of the 3rd division Norwegian side you manage."

All good ideas. I've never noticed the favoured personel bug but it seems from a few different posts that it does happen. I'd love the previous club interviews as so often theyre from someone unnamed who you can't even comment back at, whilst the realism of it to me suggests it should definitely be included somewhere along the line.

Thank you Ceching You Out and fmsteve for your comments and support.