After Football Manager 25‘s disappointing cancellation, Sports Interactive’s leading sports management sim will be making its return this fall with the release of Football Manager 26. While we know that the latest entry will mark the debut of the highly anticipated Unity engine, as well as a fully licensed Premier League, there are still plenty of questions regarding what will and what won’t be in the game when it releases.
With that in mind, I’ve taken it upon myself to put together a short wishlist of things that I either want to see included or improved upon in Football Manager 26.
Operation Sports Football Manager 26 Wishlist
International Management (And A Better One)
When Football Manager 25 was first announced, it came with a ton of excitement as that was meant to be the first game done in the Unity engine. However, because Sports Interactive needed resources in order to ensure certain aspects of the new engine ran well enough, some features were cut to make space. International management was one of those features that got the axe.
However, following FM25‘s cancellation, some Football Manager fans are hopeful that the team over at SI used the extra year of development time to reintegrate international management. But, its presence alone won’t be enough — certain improvements have to be made.
While managing clubs in Football Manager has always been one of the deeper experiences in sports simulation titles (if not the deepest), managing international teams has never felt nearly as fleshed out. Day-to-day management of international teams is extremely boring, as is the dual-national system. Nations should be fighting over dual-nats, offering playing time and featured roles as the reasons for them to join.
Should international management be back in FM 26, it needs to be a more engaging experience.
An Alternative To Touchline Shouts
I understand why touchline shouts are being removed from Football Manager. At the end of the day, it didn’t seem like they made any kind of impact. However, anyone who watches football can tell you that managers often have a ton to say, both to their players and the referees. So why not replace touchline shouts with something a bit more realistic and results-driven?
Obviously, managing over a full 90-minute match in real-time is a tough ask for even the most hardcore FM players. So, observing the minute-to-minute action isn’t really feasible. But, say for instance your assistant manager is alerting you that your advanced forward isn’t finding space in behind and is instead dropping in between the lines to get the ball more. Why not have a function that allows you to remind this player what their role on the pitch is?
Maybe I’m making that sound a bit too simple, but real-time corrections and reminding players of where to be on the pitch is a huge part of football in real life. And if we’re not going to have touchline shouts, at least give us something more tangible in its place.
Youth Team Management
One issue I’ve always had about Football Manager is that even though you can easily do a save where you can move from a small club to a bigger one over time, the overall journey doesn’t seem to align with how real-life managers actually rise through the ranks. More often than not, managers move forward in their careers by managing youth teams, reserve teams, then maybe getting an assistant job with a club before ever named the head of a senior-level team.
Obviously, this kind of process wouldn’t really appeal to some players. But the option to start in the youth ranks, become an assistant with a limited amount of responsibilities, then find your first manager job should at least be an option for the more experienced members of the community who love the overall experience, but want something just a bit deeper. As of right now, the only way to really mimic this kind of career trajectory is to manage a reserve team in a playable league, which is fair enough, I suppose. But I don’t think it’s asking too much to take that one step further.
