

You also often see news items covering players who have fired their agents. These individuals often demand a fee for their services, sometimes scuppering a deal because their own agenda conflicts with the player's. A new feature of this year's game is that the majority of players now have their own agent to handle negotiations. Contract negotiations are a staple of any football management game, but in FM 2011 they involve some actual negotiating, rather than just getting an offer and being rigidly stuck to it, no matter what the AI wants to do. Interactions are now conducted in this conversational style.ĭealing with players doesn't involve just chatting to them about their match performances it's also about how ridiculously overpaid they are.

You can ask to have a private chat with one of your players for any number of reasons talking to him about preferred signings, warning him he might get transfer listed if he doesn't buck up his ideas, or getting into a big argument because you asked him to make more forward runs and he threw his toys out of the pram. The conversation system also works with players, staff, and the media. Except this time you can choose your reasoning, which the board either agrees or disagrees with. For example, you might approach the board and ask whether they'd consider making your bargain-basement League 2 side a feeder club to a Premiership behemoth, just like you could before. Each conversation presents you with individual questions or statements you can make, and the characters you're talking to respond accordingly. Talking to the suits is done in a conversational style, which is a new method of simulating your interaction with other people throughout the season. Plus, there's more feedback about what requests you've made and how the board is dealing with them. For a start, you can see how many coaches and scouts you're allowed within the wage budget. Interacting with the moneymen used to be a relatively thankless task, but in Football Manager 2011 you get a bit more feedback on how they might react. For example, goalkeeper coaching now has two elements to it-shot stopping and handling-and employing both is crucial to getting the most out of your keepers. General training has also been improved, and individual coaches now tell you, on occasion, whether or not they specialise in anything. With a quick glance at the match preparation screen, you can see that it's perhaps because the players aren't comfortable playing the straight 4-4-2 you just switched to. In previous FM games, this was all handled behind the scenes, so this newfound transparency is a godsend for those struggling to understand why their team is playing badly. Players gradually become more comfortable with certain tactics the more you use them in matches and work on them in training, and they become more used to certain set-piece routines the more you focus on them. This ties in with an improvement in the training module, which is now also focused on the blend of your team rather than just improving raw stats. Now, you can see a pictorial representation of where your players are meant to be during certain situations, so it's much easier to make the most of your set pieces. Previously, you could set individual players to go forward, mark at the near post, go for flick-ons, and such, but it was all quite crude and left to the imagination.
#FOOTBALL MANAGER 2021 SWITCH REVIEW SERIES#
Perhaps the most obvious and significant new addition is the set-piece creator, which addresses a key aspect of football management not seen in the series to date.

Issues from the previous game have been addressed, so the match engine is better than ever, your interaction with players and the media is more extensive, and training has been revamped yet again. This year's iteration features across-the-board improvements of what has gone before, with tweaks, changes, and minor additions being the order of the day. The 3D match engine looks better than ever. Even those seasoned and battle-scarred from each preceding yearly iteration will find enough in Football Manager 2011 to reward the upgrade, and it's also the most accessible version of the game yet for newcomers. However, the series has never been about grandiose, sweeping changes-and this year's tweaks, such as the improved training system, the redone contract negotiations, and the all-new set-piece creation suite, make this year's game an absolute must-play. UK REVIEW-On paper, it might not look like a whole lot has changed in this year's Football Manager.
