Blimey, two years since I’ve had to write one of these – doesn’t time fly when you’re waiting for a new game!

I’m approaching my save reveal slightly differently this year. Usually, it’s a big, story driven post diving into the team I’ve chosen, why they’ve piqued my interest and what I am to achieve in the save. This year though, it’s going to be an overarching post with a few different things – a few ramblings about my time with FM24 and my thoughts about the new game, the actual save reveal itself, and then some plans for some extra content I have in mind too!

Looking Back

It may have overstayed its welcome, but I’ve really enjoyed FM24. It’s been a bit varied from me – I started off writing about my main save for the year, diving into the, at the time, newly licensed Japanese leagues with Tokyo Verdy. After five successful seasons I felt it was time to end the save and try something new, so with Euro 2024 approaching I decided to do a little mini-series with England where I used a data-driven approach to, spoiler alert, bring football home. That gave me a real desire to get granular, and an opportunity to try to realistically rebuild the club I support, Manchester United, was too appealing to not do. This was also the first time I shared a save on the SI Forums in addition to View From The Touchline. 

From there, things got a little bit messy. I decided to end the United save after just two seasons, partly because progress had been quicker than I’d imagined, but also because FM25 was on the horizon, and with the move to Unity and all the incredible things that was going to bring, I wanted to be in a position to be looking forward to the new game without having to finish off a current save. 

We all know what happened there! 

The delay and subsequent cancellation of FM25 left me at a crossroads, with further fuel added to the fire by a temptation to try my hand at YouTube, something I’d already previously unsuccessfully tried many years ago (and won’t be linking to!).

I started by turning a couple of my old blog posts into YouTube videos, and then started a save with Boavista to be the subject of videos. Then I got brave, and tried my hand at streaming on Twitch for the first time while playing the Boavista save. 

Truth be told, streaming wasn’t really for me, and I don’t have the comfort on camera or dedication to make a proper go of YouTube consistently – and so, for a while there was nothing. No new game to look forward to, and no save to play on the one we had. 

To round out FM24, I had the idea to do a save I’d considered as my main save before the Japanese leagues were announced – with Shakhtyor Soligorsk in Belarus. It seems I have a deep seeded desire to manage clubs just before they either face huge sanctions or straight up cease to exist, but I took on the challenge at Soligorsk because of their punishment for match fixing – two seasons of huge points deductions. It was a fun challenge, but once I steadied the ship there wasn’t really much left to achieve with how much time we had left before FM26, and so I briefly joined FC Nürnberg before ending the save. 

Looking back, there’s an overriding feeling of ‘what if’ when it comes to my time with FM24. In hindsight I feel I ended both of my ‘main’ saves too early; with Tokyo Verdy I had a poor fifth season and didn’t feel I had the desire or, ironically, time to rebuild, and with Manchester United it was just bad timing – if we’d had even just the delay announcement before I ended the save I’d have carried it on, and would have really enjoyed a decent length save bringing through youth talent. 

Instead of one or two really memorable saves, I ended up with four of five decent ones. That’s not something I want to replicate as we enter a new era of Football Manager.

The Main Save

Honestly, I thought I knew what I wanted to do for FM26 for months. I’ve got a truly terrible track record for moving clubs within saves, partly due to getting comfortable at club once I’m through the first couple of seasons, but also because I have genuine fear of making the wrong move and ruining my enjoyment of a save. 

So I was going to go outside of my comfort zone and do a journeyman, to make myself make those decisions that I usually avoid. But as I sat to write this reveal post, I just didn’t have the words for it. I couldn’t express what it was about a journeyman that I was looking forward to, or why I chose it other than ‘I haven’t done it before’. That’s not enough of a reason for me to commit to a save that I hope will last the whole game cycle, though. I know full well I’d be likely to make the first move, not really enjoy it, maybe move on again to try and rescue the save, and then give up.

Instead, I’d rather just do something I enjoy – build something meaningful at one club. 

I spent a day or so having a look at various potential starting points, with varying degrees of success. The obvious was to look in Europe, but with the exception of Tokyo Verdy all of my saves for the past five years have been European based, so finding something that felt fresh wasn’t going to be easy. I definitely wouldn’t want to start in a top five nation for a save I hope will last all year, and other nations didn’t really grab me. A good Scandinavian save always appeals, but I couldn’t find the right club or challenge to grab me right now.

Then I moved onto South America. I had a great save with Defensor Sporting from Uruguay back on Football Manager 2021, and would definitely manage there again some time, but if I was going to go back to South America I thought it best to try somewhere new. I also ruled out Brazil; I play slowly enough as it is without their fixture hell! 

The others, again, just didn’t grab me. If there had been a new South American nation added, like an Ecuador or Paraguay, then I probably would have ended up there, but I moved on – just slightly north. 

For Football Manager 26, I will be managing Deportivo Guadalajara, more commonly known as Chivas. 

There will be a proper introduction to the save closer to the full release, but for now I’ll give a few reasons why Chivas grabbed me. 

Firstly, I’ve never managed in North America. I like the idea of an MLS save, but it intimidates me to no end! I was also intrigued by the idea of managing in Canada when the league was added back in FM20, but there isn’t really much long-term appeal there for me. Mexico on the other hand seems like a perfect country for a long term save. There is passion, heritage and skill, as well as some controversy, and I think it will be an exciting nation to be in.

It also gives me a strong platform to tick off a goal I have always wanted to achieve in a Football Manager save, but never got close to – I want to win the Club World Cup with a non-European side. 

Then there are the reasons that made me choose Chivas over the other Mexican sides. The most important is that they offer a sort of Bilbao-lite save. Chivas will only sign Mexican players, however this rule is loosened slightly as they do count second nationality. This opens up a little bit of possibility to dive into some scouting in areas such as Spain and the US, but that’s a thought to be expanded on another day. 

They also offer a chance to end a relatively long trophy drought for a club of their stature. They are considered to be a part of Mexico’s ‘big four’, but their last major honour came in 2018, and they haven’t won a domestic trophy since 2017. 

Lastly, the Chicharito effect. As a Manchester United fan I have great memories of us picking up a relatively unknown striker from Mexico who went on to become a cult hero, and he felt like a spiritual successor to my all-time favourite United player, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. To not only manage Chivas, but also do it at a time where he has returned to his boyhood club, feels like a pretty special opportunity. 

But Wait, There’s More…

I want one really good, long save that I can look back on fondly in years to come as the best save I’ve ever had, but Football Manager 26 is going to (hopefully) be too revolutionary to not explore a little further. 

For the Beta period there won’t be any content from me as I’ll just be getting to grips with the game, managing Manchester United – again! I may drop the odd tweet so follow on X if you don’t already!

Once we have the full release work will start on the Chivas save, with an introductory post followed by the start of the save itself. 

Dotted throughout the year though, I’ll be doing a series of one-season saves throughout the world of women’s football! I know nothing about women’s football, and so want to take the opportunity to learn a little more by playing a save in as many of the included nations as possible. I’m also intrigued to see how different the game world looks and feels to the men’s, especially in the transfer market! I don’t have an exact style or time frame for this figured out yet, but it’s coming! 

As we’ve also had the announcement that International Management will be coming to the game in time for the World Cup, I’ll almost certainly be doing some kind of content there too when the time comes!

So all in all, I’m absolutely buzzing to finally get my hands on a game we’ve been waiting two years for. Here’s to another great year of Football Manager!