Can you improve the world's worst national team with a better youth rating and youth recruitment and a star teenage striker? The answer appeared to be yes, as Andy Selva had used those factors to lead San Marino to the 182nd best team in the world.
Having made a flying start to our Serie A title defence, it was interrupted by a mid-season break while players went off to the Winter World Cup in Qatar.
Season two in Italy had started really with AC Milan, as a club-record winning streak took us just three points behind the Zebras heading into 2022. A key man behind the success had been goal machine Andrea Belotti, supported by a solid start to life from Dominic Calvert-Lewin.
Season one in Football Manager 2021 began slowly but gradually crescendoed to Champions League qualification and lifting the Europa League with AC Milan. However, plenty of work was required in the summer of 2021 as we had a pretty threadbare squad that wasn't ready for the Champions League.
Our reign in Milan had gotten off to a solid yet unspectacular start in which we we were seriously lacking goals in the first 30 or so games in Football Manager 2021. Our main source of goals, however, was the 39-year-old Zlatan Ibrahimovic!
My Beta FM21 save sees me begin the new game in Italy's Serie A with sleeping giants AC Milan. Despite winning 18 Italian titles, the club only has two since 1999. It also has seven European Cup titles to its name, but none since 2007. And it only has one cup win since 2011. So there's plenty of space to restore glory to Milan.
Football Manager Addict 