Football Manager 2019

Couch coaches have traditionally had a tough time: the hard work in front of the television affects the vocal cords, blood pressure climbs to critical levels for 90 minutes, and the amount of expletives within this time makes gangster rappers look like good school boys. After the cultural football fiasco called the World Cup in summer 2018 (both in general and nationally), a solution finally had to be found with which millions of potential world-class coaches could finally show the spoiled football millionaires how their favorite sport really works.

The football manager has of course long been known to those in the know, but the internationally extremely successful game is now also officially available in Germany this year. With this, developer Sports Interactive closes a gap in this country that Electronic Arts had left with the inglorious last part and the discontinuation of their soccer manager series in 2013.

Can the football manager also convince fans of the German genre classics? What innovations are there for series connoisseurs who previously had to laboriously import their predecessors? And what should you bring with you so that the whole fun potential of the Football Manager unfolds from tons of tables? We'll clarify that in the test.

Database for full professionals

At the beginning we choose our starting league from 51 nations. South America, the USA, Australia or would you prefer Europe? For the first time this year, the 1st and 2nd Bundesliga are also fully licensed (other German original leagues will certainly be delivered via mod via the community). From the Cologne elevator team to the record champions Bayern Munich, the teams are complete with original player pictures. Whether a single player career or online mode: Using our self-created trainer likeness (including the option of 3D reconstruction of your own photo) we go into a management simulation with enormous complexity.

Because over 450,000 players provide one of the most powerful databases on football and soccer players ever - a database that even professional clubs tap into in reality for the purpose of scouting. We are now able to lead a small part of it to the top of the world as a team coach. Our inbox is our control center: This is where we receive messages from the board of directors, our assistant trainers, scouts, the medical department and of course the inevitable press releases.

Step by step to become a professional trainer

Beginners use the slightly stripped-down and simpler version of the game Football Manager Touch. Things like half-time speeches are omitted here, the training is simplified and the annoying press (Greetings to Uli!) Usually keeps the mouth shut. Plus, we're flooded with less detailed data. Getting started is made even easier by the new tutorial: In introductory courses, we are told exactly how scouting works, what we have to pay attention to when negotiating a contract and how the drilled-up tactics interface works. This ensures that we can find our way around information and setting options much faster in this jungle than in the previous ones.

Very helpful: Immediately after the introductions, we can decide whether we should configure the respective job (e.g. training) ourselves or rather hand it over to our staff. In this way, beginners can automate almost everything and slowly get a feel for the game without having to stare at individual menus for hours without any action. The accessibility in connection with the touch version is very well done by Sports Interactive.

Real soccer nerds are not satisfied with their AI colleagues. From the team structure, the depth of the squad, the daily training units, individual additional tasks through detailed scouting to the development of talent in the U19 can and must be monitored and configured in detail. The amount of data that is available on a single player can be overwhelming at first : 36 attributes in the areas of technique, psyche and physique determine how good a kicker is up to date. It's not just about basic football skills like passing, crossing or dribbling. Teamwork, positional play and enthusiasm are also important characteristics of a top kicker and we have to work specifically on strengths and weaknesses in the detailed new training plan.

New tools for tactical foxes

In this way, we do not stand in front of the mountain like an ox, but get a basis on which we can build and easily adapt individual exercise units. Click on the unit, select a category (e.g. defense) and then choose one of five different variants (e.g. active or waiting defense).

The same goes for the three-part tactical system . Once we have set one of the above tactics, we can use our squad to make changes with just a few clicks (for example, adjust the way a player interprets his position - offensive, defensive or supportive) and thus adapt perfectly to the opponent.

At least if we have scouted it properly. The knowledge gained depends on the skills of our scouts and can be very helpful. Thermal imaging data shows us where the opponent was particularly active in the last game and we can see where the decisive passes came from and by whom. Accordingly, we determine whether we press aggressively when the opponent has possession of the ball, whether we hold the formation in the switching game or counter quickly and which side of the field we prefer to play on in our own attack.

As on the tactics board, so in the game

We're taking it to the extreme by giving specific instructions to individual players. For example, we are positioning the Leipzig striker Timo Werner more offensively in order to use his speed and tell him to shoot more often. At the same time, we're instructing our team to put Javi Martínez under close man coverage in the game against Bayern. The special thing about these subtleties: We can observe all of this in the 3D game exactly as arranged.

Games are always completely simulated, regardless of whether we watch them for a full 90 minutes or choose one of the highlight variants in the extensive settings. This makes the result more realistic and far less dependent on chance than has always been the case with German football managers. The moves are sometimes extremely realistic and great to look at, even if, from a purely technical point of view, the player animations naturally kick a couple of leagues under FIFA or Pro Evolution Soccer.

If we have stopped short passing, our kickers try to move forward with quick double passes. If our tactic works with flat flanks, the wingers run to the baseline and bring the ball into the middle. If an opponent shows himself to be in a particularly good mood, we instruct our team to tackle him hard. It is a pleasure to see the central defenders slide the ball off the striker's foot, where they were just a short time before like extras. It's less cool when they see red for it - but hey, even the video referee can't always see everything right!

The assistant coach also keeps giving us tips about the game and the players, for example if we should replace a player at risk of injury. If a player's stamina and playing practice do not match, he has a higher risk of injuries. So we have to make sure that we absorb double and triple loads through rotation. Anyone who previously believed that the reference to long English weeks in professional football was just an excuse will learn quite emphatically from the Football Manager that footballers are not machines and that athletes need sufficient regeneration.

Stale presentation without finesse

With all the predominantly surprisingly accurate realism of the game (quote: "Striker Werner crowned his performance by running offside without stopping.") And the 3D representation (impatient players also get comprehensible results with the instant calculation) we have to do with the graphic finesse make enormous compromises . Neither the animations nor the field graphics can inspire, it looks like it was ten years ago. Although there were no bugs in our test, the viewers look like participants in a North Korean propaganda event.

The goalkeeper also likes to use "magic tricks" to pull balls that he shouldn't be able to get at. After all: The amount of really stupid and barely comprehensible mistakes has become quite rare, the ball physics is successful and although sometimes too many goals are scored too early, most of the results make sense. If our team is well-rehearsed and the team atmosphere is in good shape, we can sweep a sub-class opponent off the field in double digits. A few game days later, on the other hand, we jump from our chair jubilantly when the equalizer to 2-2 falls in stoppage time in a high-class European Cup match.

Even if Sports Interactive can still tweak the fine-tuning here and there: The results very solidly reflect the skills of the respective team. Our tactics have a direct and visible impact on the game. The way we treat our players, whether and how often we use them, whether they play in their ideal positions or not, has an impact on the morale of the entire team. A player who has a very good relationship with the coach is more willing to accept losses in the successful transfer negotiations than a football prodigy plagued by starry airs who thinks he has eaten wisdom with a spoon. But the truth is - we all know that very well - on the pitch.