I wrote one of these blogs last year so I figured, with Football Manager 22 just around the corner, I’d do the same again this year. Mainly because I’m really excited about the epic challenge I’ve come up with for this year’s game.
FM21 has seen me rebuild Bolton to fairly extreme levels and trek around Eastern Europe winning every title available in that region. However, while I don’t want to say either of those epic journeys were easy, I want a bit more of a realistic challenge this year.
Also, the task of maintaining two ongoing saves was a bit of a nightmare, so I’m keen to reduce that down to one long-term save. And on those two saves I racked up more than 50 years of in-game management, so I’m also keen to get stupidly far into the future on FM22.
If it all goes wrong, then I may have a couple of ideas up my sleeve for what else to do on FM22.
FM22 Beta save: Sampdoria, Italy
I honestly have no idea why I want to manage Sampdoria. But the other day, I randomly decided it might be a fun challenge that no-one else is doing for the first few weeks of FM22.
Sampdoria’s a club with very little trophy success in its history. It won the Cup Winners’ Cup in 1990, its one and only Serie A title in 1991 then reached the European Cup Final the following year, only to lose to Barcelona. Repeating those feats anytime soon will be a challenge as their youth recruitment is pretty weak and they don’t have much money. That said, they do have Euro 2020 star Mikkel Damsgaard, wonderkid Mohamed Ihatarren on loan from Juventus and a decent young goalkeeper in Emil Audero, and evergreen old boy Fabio Quagliarella.
Again, I have no idea why this is randomly appealing to me. Apart from they have really cool kits.
FM22 Starter Save: Aventura de las Américas
Having conquered Eastern Europe and most of Western Europe on the last couple of editions of FM, the next continent to crack is the Americas. Plus, how cool does that save name sound?
This save idea has been largely inspired by the four months I spent in South / Latin America in 2019, where I experienced the unbelievable passion that these people have for fútbol. However, we’re not just talking South and Latin America but also North America.
That means we’re looking to win the three available top-tier titles in North America: Canada, México and United States of America.
And the six available top-tier titles in South America: Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Peru and Uruguay.
Add to those the various continental tournaments like the Copa Libertadores, Copa Sudamericana and the CONCACAF Champions League, as well as the COPA Ámerica, and this is a real challenge.
However, one of the big issues I had with my Eastern Europe journeyman save was that I got a big job at Galatasaray far too soon, in just my third season. And that’s really unrealistic. So this time, I think I’m going to start unemployed and go on the job hunt with terrible coaching attributes and minimal coaching badges, which means we’ll need to start at the bottom and build ourselves up in the American football system.
It sounds like a massive challenge, but I’m really excited about the prospect.
Additional save ideas
If it all goes wrong in North and South America, which seems fairly likely, I do still have a couple of other ideas I’ve been storing up for a while.
Football Director: I started a YouTube series managing Lille, where I delegated control of transfer activity to my Director of Football. It was fun for a while but the recording died off, so I’m keen to try and revisit the idea. It involves taking over a team that has a good Director of Football and doing everything bar transfers, to see whether we can manage the side to success.
Major League Soccer: I also started a YouTube save with Inter Miami, but didn’t get around to finishing the first season. I’m really keen to tackle the MLS, get my head around how it works and do a long-term save in the league, so that’s a standalone option aside from the American adventure if that all goes wrong.
For more ideas about who and where to manage in FM22, check out my guide of 22 teams to manage on FM22.
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