Football Manager 2017: 15 Essential Challenges You Need To Tackle

The Challenge: Break the cycle, make Sunderland something other than annual whipping boys who come alive 30 games in and scrape to survival.

You're going to have to over-haul the squad, to say the least. Sunderland may have some great individual talents, but it's hard to break the cycle of poor form that has seen them struggle in real life. Even potentially top European talents like Lamine Kone struggle for form (to the point where five years down the line most of the most saleable assets actually stick around after relegation - and it's an inevitable looking at the sims run so far).

As Sunderland manager, you'd need to add more goals to the front-line to take the pressure off Jermain Defoe (Fabio Borini will get 10 or so goals a season, but you still need another one). And creating more goals and stopping them going in are just as important. Basically, you've got to change the climate of losing and reinvent the philosophy at the club and that takes a lot of effort.