Every single Football Manager player has his/her own way how he/she plays the game. No matter how demanding, a dedicated and passionate player he/she is. I’m the same. And for some unknown reason(s) I had the urge to put together some notes about what I did when my main Football Manager 2023 save was created and I hit the save button for the first time.

That was the signal everything is set and in the right place. And I can start another journey and another new chapter of my common life with this game. It’s not a guide or some kind of how to do this and this. It’s just my thoughts about some topics.

Setting up the database & the pre-game editor changes

I thought that I will not use the pre-game editor prior to the start of the FM23 save but I was wrong. When I created the save for the first time and I thought everything is ready, I created the tactics, I added the first players to the line-up and I found IT. Someone set the default back of the shirt in the same layout as the front of the shirt - two black stripes. That means the black font of the shirt numbers was unreadable. The fact I would have to pay around 9 euros for buying the in-game editor if I would find this later… fu*k me nicely!

So, I installed the pre-game editor. I loaded the database, changed the kit layout and also changed the colour of the home kit/shorts and icon as the club’s primary yellow shade was different from the yellow shade of the home kit. Not sure why but it’s very common in the game. If some of you remember my FM22 save with Warta and the twin cities idea, I decided to make it again when I already had the editor opened.

I found out that Venlo is connected with Gorizia, Klagenfurt and Krefeld. So I went to search for clubs from these towns.

Pro Gorizia and VfR Krefeld-Fischeln will be lower league sides, probably without a chance to reach some playable league but Austria Klagenfurt from the Austria top division can be an interesting connection. I also decided to add F91 Dudelange as our regional academy as I want to have one Luxembourg club here + I added SLW Maaseik as one of the closest Belgium cities to Venlo and Holand borders (maybe we can create some kind of BE-NE-Lux youth team, who knows…) All of these clubs are set as our regional academy. We also have a connection with West Ham United (we are just a standard affiliated club) but I will find out what the pros of this connection will be in the future of the save.

In terms of the database, I loaded a couple of nations + I activated Luxembourg's top division and Netherlands’ third tier. I thought about adding Africa but decided against it in the end. I tick the 'players from top division clubs' and 'top clubs' options from the whole of Europe in the hope it will ensure enough youth intake around Europe.

Friendlies

When the save started, there were already five friendly matches set. I added six more to our schedule. There are some weeks with just one free day between matches but the reason is very simple - the tactics. I decided to try a new formation with just one central defender and I decided I want to test everything as much as possible before the competitive season will start. Especially as the out of possession instructions are different and contains some new (or renamed and divided) instructions.

Training schedules

Editing and filling the training calendar should be divided into two parts. Firstly, it’s connected to the friendlies arranged and I had to react to calendar changes after friendlies were confirmed. Because if I would leave the training calendar up to the AI, it’s possible there would be physical (or other demanding) sessions between matches and I would risk injuries of my players.

Secondly, I like to create training schedules for home & away competitive matches. I also like to create some kind of variations and just swap between them through the month(s). I like to concentrate on the attacking phase more while we have a home match ahead and I like to include more tactical, structured and defensive sessions when we play away from home. Despite the training calendar/schedule/session is not perfect, it’s one of the best additions to the game in recent years I really like to create new schedules and I like to react to changes.

It was a little bit different this time as the matchday of the Keuken Kampionen Divisie (Eerste Divisie) is set to Friday and that meant I had to play differently with the starting point of the week & training peak of the week & match preparation.

Promoting youngsters to the first team

This is another part that’s connected to the friendlies and training schedules mentioned above. I would not be able to play 11 friendly matches with players in the squad from the opening day. There were 2 goalkeepers and 21 outfield players (two of them injured). That means I sorted the reserves squad by age and I promoted 10 players to the first team.

It will give me 1) a chance to get to know these young players and 2) I will have no problem with the squad rotation at the beginning of the save. Especially as the first transfer window is disabled and I have no chance of buying some new players. It resulted in a squad of 3 goalkeepers and 30 outfield players. It will be reduced surely during the pre-season or just before the start of the competitive season.

The contract extension on day one

If you will/would pay enough attention to the squad screen above, you would notice there is a 19-year-old Albanian midfielder Ertan Hajdaraj. He is not a superstar but I really don’t know why he has only an amateur contract with the club. He joined the club in 2019 from Gladbach and played 7 matches last season. He is wanted by almost half of the clubs from our league. I want to play the CM(A) role and I think he can be a great player for this role if he will improve some things. Mainly the physical part of his play and composure. He can also turn into a very solid Advanced Playmaker if I would decide to use this role.

I hit the new magic button to discuss the contract with his agent and they wanted another amateur contract without being paid. Not sure why it is. Maybe someone who knows something about this situation will read this and will give me some info. But I gave him a professional contract until 2024. It feels almost like the first signing…

He was also the first player from all who got the individual training regime - CM(A) + Final Third additional Focus + Double Intensity + Gets Forward Whenever Possible trait.

Staff

• Monthly Staff Meeting - one of the first things you have to do when the save starts or you join the new club. I accepted the “invitation” to the opening monthly staff meeting but I immediately ended with the option to skip to the end and changed the frequency from every week to every month. Why? Because I want to get to know the club, staff and players by myself. I don’t want to accept all the suggestions just because AI think it’s a good idea. Not everything by AI is a good idea…

• Staff haunting for free slots and keeping the current members - there are two things connected to the staff. There are a couple of vacant roles within our staff. My traditional thing when the save starts are that I never fire some staff member. I always give them at least the first season before their contract will expire. The first thing is that I usually don’t know them but there is also a possibility they can improve through gaining coaching badges and there is also a big chance I will not be able to sign a better replacement. In the VVV’s scouting department there Marc van Hintum is a Chief Scout and he earns €3,400 p/m. But he is not willing to change his role to an ordinary scout when I wanted to change it. The reason is simple, there also is Stan Valckx who earns €21,500 p/m but more importantly he is way better in terms of attributes, personality… I will wait for the end of the first season to replace the first one to save money and I will hope I will have enough to extend the contract with Valckx. I will also try to search (manually, never do the staff adverts, that’s a waste of time) for the best possible new staff for the vacant roles (highlighted yellow in the picture below).

• Staff responsibilities - despite I like to do most of the in-game things by myself, even I delegate some things to my staff. One of the most common changes is who is providing me with the player reports within my own team. It’s usually between the assistant manager and head of youth development (because I play with young players a lot so the HoYD has a strong word). At the beginning of the save with VVV, I’m fortunate to have very quality HoYD in Roger Bongaerts who will provide me with these reports because the assistant managers are not as good as Bongaerts. There’s a possibility it will remain like this for a long time because I found out while writing this that Bongaerts has a contract until 2027.

Custom views

The squad screen I shared above contains the custom view made by Adam / FM Stag who shared his incredible work with all of us and I decided to try it. It’s for the first time in a very long time I decided to not create my own views. I miss a couple of things here and here - I, for example, always liked to have a separate squad view for the opponents’ team or the view for the national team but that’s something I can do very quickly by myself. The work by Adam is fantastic, check it out.

Miscellaneous

• Sorting the sidebar icons - I like to play with the “sidebar icons only” option (you can change it in Preferences/Interface, no need to make skin changes) and I also like to customise the order of the icons. I know I mentioned this in the past already. I like to have Schedule and Home bottom of the sidebar, mailbox separated, the same as tactics and training. All the squads with team report and development centre together. The rest contain three groups related to the club info, scouting and transfers and the last three are the "most rest" I used very less.

• Shortcuts - they are important to make my play easier, more comfortable a more useful. I, for example, have the middle mouse button set as continue so I don’t have to smash the spacebar every time. And many more including all the F1-F12 keys. I wrote about it more during FM20 but the main point is the same.

• Changing in-game currency from £ to €.

• Changing in-game wage from weekly to monthly.

• Setting the Auto Saves format to After Matches with 3 File Rolling Auto Save.

What to do next?

The notes above I made just within one in-game day. Maybe I forgot something more but I would say these are the most important things I did in the opening hours of the save. The next step is to put the tactics together as the first friendly match is scheduled for the afternoon of the second day of the save.

I know I will have to make changes to the scouting recruitment team in terms of who is responsible for assigning scouts - I know I don’t want Marc van Hintum in a charge of the recruitment team so it’s pointless to leave him as the one who decides about where our scouts will go during the first season.

As there is no option to select a different scout, I will do it on my own. I will set the mentoring groups, create the first pack of set pieces, and create the custom screen flow with a focus on youth competitions around Europe…

Too many other things to do in the next few days.

But now, I will hit the continue button…